


Hybrids and Demons

by poisonkiwifruit



Category: No Fandom, Original Work
Genre: Anal Sex, Canon Gay Character, Child Death, Choking, F/M, M/M, OC, Original Character Death(s), Original Character(s), Partial Nudity, Swearing, Violence, human hybrids
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-15
Updated: 2016-10-21
Packaged: 2018-04-26 12:54:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Major Character Death
Chapters: 9
Words: 42,817
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5005552
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/poisonkiwifruit/pseuds/poisonkiwifruit
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>This is a story featuring my original characters as animal/human hybrids. I am mostly posting this story to get feedback because I've been writing it since a few years ago, this of course meaning it's a mix of good and bad language. Because I've been writing it over a large span of time, (with major writer's block gaps in between), the story may seem confusing, etc. I look for constructive feedback if you choose to read, if I've missed any details or didn't explain enough, tell me what I can do to improve it. Or you can leave me a nice comment to boost my ego. My OCs have really unusual names so try to bear with it. I think the story is pretty interesting but who knows. It's also mostly finished- I'M WORKING ON IT! Enjoy! Or not...<br/>*Edit: It is completely finished now and I hate it :)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

** Chapter 1 **

 

                There was a full moon out, shining down on the royal grounds. Guards silently patrolled the outside and inside of the castle, searching the royal gardens, a popular place for trespassing. They roamed the great halls of the castle, seeking out any intruders. They were all trying to protect their precious king, Zodiac, for there had been many assassination attempts on him as of late. However, none of the guards noticed the three figures stealthily sneaking right by every single one of them.

                “Up there,” The tallest figure pointed with his paw to a tower just ahead of them. “We just have to climb the tower and go through the window.”  
                Another spoke, “Hehe, I can’t believe what we heard was true. His majesty should probably stop sleeping with his window open.” She looked to the tallest figure. “Will you be alright climbing the tower, Night?”   
                “It shouldn’t be that hard.”  
                “Can we go already?” complained the third, “There may not be any guards around here, but we can’t stand around, chatting idly.”   
                “Final’s right, we can’t screw up. I’ll go first.” Night walked toward the tower, his partners in crime trailing behind him. His claws elongating as he placed a paw onto the cold stone wall. Then a hind leg followed suit, until Night was easily scaling the tower, looking much like a moving shadow, and entered swiftly through the window.

                Final was next, his animal appendages made it easy for him the climb the tower, considering they were that of a spider monkey’s. He joined Night inside the tower, almost saying something about how easy this was, but Night quickly silenced him before he could say anything.

                In no time, the third figure, Snow, joined Final and Night inside the tower. Inside was an opulent looking room. The furniture was a deep, rich purple and dark green colors. Pillows of the couch were laced with gold and ancient treasures and vases decorated the room in a humble fashion. Though it didn’t seem the new ruler was all that humble. Surely after a few more months, this room would be filled to the brim with all kinds of treasure. That is, if he lives that long.

                “Do you think he’s still sleeping?” Final asked, a bit hesitant.  
                Night turned his yellow-green eyes onto Final, the glow of his snake eyes intimidating the boy. “He is, I can see his heat signature. You aren’t getting cold feet are you, Final?”  
                “No, just wondering is all…”  
                “Maybe you can sneak up on him Snow?” suggested Night.  
                “I thought that was what we were planning to do anyway.” She responded, and in an instant, disappeared. Or more like, blended in- being part chameleon was useful for that, just as it was for climbing longitudinal surfaces like the tower. She reappeared next to the king’s royal bed, green, almost transparent drapes hung down from the rooftop of the bed. Snow peaked through the drapes a bit, signaled that the king was still indeed sleeping. “Yeah, it looks like he’s out cold.”  
                Night easily responded with, “Then you may have the honor of slaying the king.”  
                Snow covered her mouth, stifling an uncontrollable yet excited laugh.   
                “Can you hurry up?” Final blurted impatiently. When Night look at him, he noticed that Final was fidgeting as if something were bothering him.  
                “Are you alright Final?”  
                “This is just too easy. I feel like something is about to go wrong…,”  
                “It’ll be fine,” Night assured. “None of the guards saw us while we were sneaking in. We were properly trained for this and for anything that may interfere. There isn’t anything that we can’t handle.”

                “But what if the king is awake? Were you all trained for that?”

                Snow jumped back a bit, frightened by the new voice. She looked to the roof of the bed, where the voice had come from, seeing two slitted, bright yellow eyes watching her.

                “I apologize did I frighten you? I could not bear interrupting the conversation.”  
                “You’re supposed to be in your bed,” Snow looked through the drapes again and saw that no one was there, “I saw you! I saw him in there!”  
                “Snow, calm down,” Night ordered.

                “You know, you think you are clever for tiptoeing your way around my sentinels, but really, they aren’t any good. You have noticed all the assassination attempts recently? Those guards are hardly worth their salt. I honestly cannot fathom why I keep them around.”  
                “Get over here Snow,” Night said firmly, “we need to leave.” He instinctively stepped in front of Final, whispering “don’t you dare move,” to him. Final became angered but made no effort to disobey.  
                “You filthy peasants!” his majesty jumped down from his bed, his long, dark, and wavy hair falling at his shoulders. He blocked Snow’s path back toward Final and Night with a long dark wing. “I hope you all did not think you could just infiltrate my chambers without any consequences.”  
                “Night…,” Snow was starting to freaking out.  
                “Calm down Snow,” he told her once more, “you’re fine.”  
                “’Fine’?  You do realize what happened to those in the past who attempted to kill me, right? I ripped their throats out,” Zodiac licked his lips, “I will enjoy doing the same to you three!” He jumped at Snow, aiming for her neck. She screamed and instantly disappeared, desperately trying to escape.

                Enraged, Final ducked under Night’s arm and attacked Zodiac, punching him right in the face. Zodiac’s head snapped back but he didn’t move. He gave Final a menacing look and backhanded the boy into the floor. Final swore, writhing terribly with his face in his palms. Night, who had found his way behind Zodiac in seconds, dragged his claws against his majesty’s back. Zodiac let out a horrible cry and grabbed him.

                “You better hope what they say about all cats landing on their feet is true,” Zodiac gritted out. Night’s eyes widened but before he had the chance to react, Zodiac chucked him out the open window.  
                “No, Night!” Snow screamed, reappearing at the window.             
                “Would you like to join him?”   
                Snow turned her head, seeing that Zodiac was right behind her. He grabbed her by the neck and dangled her outside of the window.  
                “Let her go!” Final shouted, recovering from the last attack.

  
                “Hm, not the best choice of words,” Zodiac commented and laughed when he heard Snow whimper. He loosened his grip. “Oh no, it appears my hand is slipping. Wouldn’t it be a shame if I-,” He let go of Snow but quickly grabbed her with his other hand. “That was close wasn’t it,” he laughed again.  
                “F-final…scarf,” these were the only words Snow could get out.  
                “But I-,”  
                “Hm, I grow tired of this,” the king interrupted and drop Snow from the window.

                Snow screamed. It was hopeless. The wall was too far away for her to grab, she could only fall. That’s all she thought until something caught her by her right arm. Nervous, panicky, yet thrilled laughter burst from Snow. “Night!”  
                He dug his nails into the wall as far as far as they would go, but they were slowly sliding downward against the stone. “Look, I don’t have opposable thumbs so it would be great if you could get yourself situated now.”  
                Snow quickly apologized and crawled onto the wall, where she stuck instantly. Night regained his balance but still had trouble maintaining a grip on the wall. “Ugh, my nails are going to be jagged,” he said under his breath, “Final is still up there?”  
                “Yeah, and we may have a bit of a problem…”  
                “What?”  
                “I told him to take his scarf off…”  
                “He isn’t stable, why would you tell him to do that?”  
                Snow bit her lip nervously, “We’re kind of at a disadvantage here. The king is a lot stronger and faster than we thought he would be. We really didn’t have a plan for when he woke up.”  
                “Yes but, Final can’t lose his shit now. That will just make everything worse!”  
                Snow explained,“I thought his instability would have enough stamina to tire Zodiac out or something.”   
                _Well she isn’t necessarily wrong,_ Night thought, _but will he do it is the question._

The scream that echoed out into the night, probably waking up the entire castle easily answered his question. Night wondered why Final always screamed when he turned. Was it painful?

“Couldn’t he scream a little quieter?” Snow asked irritatedly. “We have to hurry up and leave now. All the guards probably heard that.”

Night nodded at the suggestion and the two hurriedly scaled the tower once more. However,  as soon as they reached the window, something flew out of it, whizzing past the top of their heads. Then something else, screaming.

A half bestial Final had managed to toss the king out of the window, then jump out along with him, with the intention to cause more damage.

"Annoying little monkey!" Zodiac screeched, bursting open his wings and creating a blast of wind to blow Final back.

Final hit the tower, creating a dent, but immediately he bounced back, jumping on Zodiac and breaking off one of his horns.

"Ah...!" Zodiac reached up to where his right horn used to be. Tears filled his eyes. "You whelp!" He grabbed the boy, holding him in front of him, and dove to the ground. Final hit the ground, his eyes widening from the shock of the blow.

"Shit. Snow go find Final's scarf," ordered Night. "I'll take care of the king."

"Gotcha." She climbed back to the tower while Night slid down toward the ground to Final.

"You're still alive?" Zodiac asked as he stared down at Final, who was slowly getting back up, growling intensely. "Don't worry, I'll fix that in a minute." He place a sharp fingernail to Final's throat and pressed down hard. A bead of blood bubbled up but nothing more, as Night came up and kicked Zodiac away, then grabbed Final and scurried along into the nearby forest.

Final thrashed about as Night carried him, screaming bloody murder. "Final shut up! Stop moving around so much! It's me, Night!" The boy in his arms seized his tantrum a moment, recognizing the name, but just a quickly continued to go crazy. “Quiet! He’ll find us-!” Night turned suddenly and jumped back a few feet. A stream of fire burned in the place he once stood and Zodiac flew by overhead.

“You cannot find what you haven’t _lost_!” He shouted and another stream of fire blasted from his mouth. Trees and shrubberies were set ablaze and the flames spread quickly.

“Shit! He’s going to burn down the entire forest!” and just as Night said as he heard yelling in the distance.

“Ah, my incompetent guards have finally arrived.” Zodiac said and chuckled to himself. “Though they’re far too late. It’s funny to think that if I had been as skilled as they were, you three probably would have killed me by now.” he smirked. And then it was gone. Zodiac’s eyes narrowed, “Where is your third party? Surely she isn’t performing her little disappearing act now?” his head jerked in the direction of the castle tower. “Is she in my castle?”

“Just retrieving a little something for us,” Night said, as he adjusting the still struggling FInal on his shoulder. He wondered why he even said that.

But his words had apparently struck a nerve in their king. “Something? You couldn’t mean...but how could you peasants know?!” Zodiac then took off as fast as his wings would allow, back to the castle.

“What the…?” Night shook his head. He couldn't bother with it now the forest fire was spreading and they needed to leave. “Where is-”

“Hey, I’m back!” Snow exclaimed and Night jumped. “Whoa! What the hell is wrong with you?” she took in the rather interesting sight of Night and his fur that was now sticking up angrily.

“...I didn’t see you,” he admitted.

“Well puff back down, kitty. Don’t want your fur to catch fire,” she handed him the yellow scarf in her hands, to which Night wrapped around Final’s neck. The boy immediately passed out.

“Great, I still have to carry him.” Night began to dash away from the flames.

“Hey, can you carry me too?” Snow asked trying to keep up.

“No.” Night deadpanned.

“Aww, I hate running,” she looked down at her poor, zygodactyl, chameleon feet as she ran.“it hurts…” she whined.

“Unless you want to burn to death, you better keep running.”

 


	2. Chapter 2

 

Night and Snow had managed to find and stream of water, a ways from the flames that had eventually been extinguished by, Night assumed, the king’s guards. He put Final, and Snow, who he began carrying at some point while they were still running because her feet _really hurt,_ on the ground and immediately went for the water.

“So,” Snow started as she began to rub her aching feet as well, “tell me, why exactly didn’t we have a plan for if the king was awake?”

 “Well, I suppose we just didn’t think that far ahead.” Night responded the proceeded to dunk his head into the stream of water.

“What are we gonna do now?”

Night tossed his head back from the water, his long dark hair clinging and dripping “We don’t get paid. Not unless we go back anyway.” he walked to Final, a few feet away, and wrung out his hair onto him, instantly waking the boy.

“Gah!...What the hell, Night!” Final shouted.

“It’s about time you woke up. My shoulders hurt from carrying you all night. You and Snow.” Night sent a glare to Snow, to which she responded to with a toothy grin.

“What?” Final stood up. “Where...where are we?”

“A few miles from town,” answered Night.

“Wait, what about King Zodiac?”

“Unfortunately, he’s still alive.”

Snow declared, “You know you went batshit crazy as usual, but you broke one of the king’s horns,” she laughed loudly, “the look on his face was priceless! He was like _Oh no my horn! Bleh!_ ”

“He almost killed Final,”

Snow shrugged, “He’s still alive though, sooo…”

“So we’re not getting paid?” asked Final.

Night shook his head. “Not right now at least. If we stayed any longer, we would have been burned alive,”

“Well...thinking about it, it was kinda unrealistic of us to think that _we_ could just assassinate our king,” Final admitted, “We didn’t even have a plan for if he woke up. And now when I think about it, we also didn’t wear anything to cover our faces. The king knows who we are now.”

Night scoffed and waved a paw. "Minor details. We’re going back."

“Minor details?” Snow questioned.

Final was more concerned with the latter half of his statement.“We’re going _back_?”

“Did you see that bag of gold our client had? Of course we’re going back!” Snow exclaimed. She laughed wildly, “The meat I could buy…”

“Yes, it was a rather large amount of gold,” continued Night, “however that’s not why I want to go back. Snow, didn’t you see the way the king was acting before he flew off- like he was in a hurry or something?”

“What are you talking about?” she said.

“He noticed that you were gone and thought that you were still in the castle, but you were just a few seconds away. Now I did mention that you were getting something for us, but I didn’t say it was Final’s scarf. That’s when Zodiac became very concerned and flew back to the castle. He said something about _how we peasants knew._ ”

“So, what? You think he’s got something special in the castle?” Snow asked.

Night shrugged, “I don’t know. I’m curious, that’s why I want to go back.”

“Well you know, curiosity killed the cat,” Final stated, “you being the cat. Night.” Night stared at the boy blankly. “Y-you know because you’re a black panther and tha-”

“Yeah, I got it Final.” he shook his head. Snow was chuckling silently in the background. “Anyway, are you two going to join me or am I going alone?”

“Yeah, I guess I’ll go.” Final muttered.

“Of course I’m going!” Snow said.

“Great. Now we need to smart about this. Because we can’t just waltz into the castle without knowing what the king’s hiding or knowing if he’s even hiding anything at all. We need to have a legit plan.”

“So what you’re saying is that we _not_ do what we did last night.” stated Snow.

Night’s tail twitched irritably. “Just fucking follow me.”

 

\---

 

“Sir! This chamber is secure!” a royal guard practically shouted after he bowed respectfully in the presence of his majesty.

Zodiac narrowed his eyes. “Have you gone inside?”

“No, I have not, sir! That is strictly prohibited and punishable by death, sir! You made this very clear, sir.”

“Then how, pray tell, in the hell would you know if it was secure or not?”

The guard hesitated a moment, “Because no one has come this way, except for other guards during the shift change, sir.”

“The foolish trio who tried to have my head last night had amongst them a master of camouflage. Are you to tell me now that you are certain this chamber is completely secure?”

“...N-no sir.” the mere sound of Zodiac’s angering voice made the guard tremble.

Zodiac opened the door and went inside. A few minutes later he came out, shutting the door quietly. “It appears you are competent enough, therefore, I shall let you live yet another day.”

“Milord, I am honored to receive such kindness.” the guard bowed again.

“Yes, yes,” Zodiac said curtly, walking away quickly before he bloodied his hands. Yes, his guards weren’t the best to have around, but, though he loathed to admit it, the guards had their uses. Not against assassins but apparently everything else. He thought of the guarded chamber that was now far out of sight. There were always attempts on his life. But could it have been possible that there had been more than usual? _No, no, no, surely it’s coincidental,_ Zodiac tried to convince himself, but clearly he was lucky that the chameleon girl didn’t make it to his precious chamber. _Maybe they know...or maybe they did not._ Whether they knew about what lie in the chamber or not the king had decided, “These assassins are getting out of hand…”

“Is something troubling you?”

Zodiac lifted his head and saw that he had somehow made it to his throne and had been looming ominously over the throne, deep in thought.

Her voice had broken his train of thought, but she realized that he didn’t truly register that she had said anything. So she spoke once more,“Your Majesty?”

This time Zodiac’s ears perked and he turned to witness the female Demon, some mix between a greyhound and a mongoose,  just a foot behind him. Completely covered in a luxurious fur coat of brown, that matched her simple, wavy brown mane, and even more basic light brown eyes. Yes, she was in fact plain, but his personal goddess of beauty regardless. He took a knee in her presence, feeling like a complete tool for staring too long, “My queen!”

“Please. I am but a handmaid. Rise, milord. You’re embarrassing me.”

“Hardly a handmaid if you bear my children, Dream.” Zodiac stated and she blushed at the thought.

“Milord, please rise! Also, forgive me for saying so, but please shut up!”

“You are forgiven, Dream. Now what is it you want?”

“I came to check on you.” she admitted.

“Your concern has already soothed my anguished soul.”

Dream rolled her eyes, “Please, spare me your fancy tongue. I overheard you speaking of assassins. Was your life threatened once again?”

“Once again,” the king repeated and laughed. “You jest. There hasn’t been one killer of the night that has come close to threatening my life."

“Of course. And one has never broken one of your horns either.” she laughed at his slight expression of annoyance.

“...However,” the addition of this “however” caught Dream’s attention. “I fear that word of what lies in the inner chamber may have gotten out.” Her eyes widened. "Fret not, everything is in place. I am thinking of increasing security around there."

"Even I know that these guards aren't the most reliable ones around."

Zodiac sighed, "Yes, but it is better than nothing. They aren't so brain dead that they can't guard a simple door."

"I hope it is enough..."

"Do not worry, my queen. Whether they be killers or thieves, they are both easy to deal with and easily disposable."

 

\---

 

"Why do we meet everyone in a bar?" Snow couldn't help but ask. The trio sat around an empty round table. The bar seemed extra crowded.

"We live in a town full of mercenaries and thieves what do you expect?" Night responded. "Alcohol is great."

"You don't drink Night."

"I...indulge myself every once in a while."

"He's a fucking lightweight." Final stated outright.

"Fuck you Final."

"One sip and he's gone. Also, he doesn’t have actual hands that can pick things up so he has to get a bowl and lap it up like the pussy he is." Final continued. Snow was sniggering hard.

Night shook his head. “Why do I even hang around you two?”

"Is that true though?" inquired Snow, "I'm curious now." Night's silence had her laughing so hard she was afraid her stomach would burst. "It is!?"

"No!...I'm not a lightweight..." Final had now joined Snow her laughing Night thought about killing both of them. Then he thought better of it. As annoying as they were they were still pretty handy. And he supposed they were his _friends._

 

"What the hell did you just say to me!?" the three heard an accented voice yell. The three looked to where the shout came from. “Say it again, you filthy human!” A Hybrid, a mountain lioness, with brilliant dark skin and short, orange hair, was yelling furiously.

“M-m-ma’am, it is against our policy for y-you to look like...th-that.” the human bartender pointed at her bare human breast, the only part of her that seemed to maintain humanoid features.

“You stupid humans all say the same thing. These things aren’t for sexual pleasure, they’re for feeding my next of kin that I choose to have!”

“R-regardless ma’am, it is still against our policy.”

 

“That’s probably her, right?” Final muttered to Snow and Night.

Night observed the Hybrid girl’s face, “She has the scar our client told us about, so yes.”

“If not we could always bar hop some more,” Snow suggested.

“No, I’m pretty sure it’s her,” Night said firmly.

The hybrid’s voice sounded again, “Fine! Fuck this place! There are better bars anyway.” She knocked over some poor Demon’s drink and headed for the door.

“Oh great, she’s leaving,” Snow said.

“Let’s go,” ordered Night as he stood up to track the Hybrid. Final and Snow followed suit. The three caught her outside the bar. “Excuse us but are you Storm King?”

The Hybrid turned rather suddenly, looking defensive. “Who the hell’re you three? How do you know my name?”

“Our client, told us about you,” Night told her, “He told us you had a run in with our beloved king. He says you put up a pretty good fight against him and it sounded perfect to us.”

“ _He_ huh? Would _he_ be Solstice Augusta? Is he still trying to get someone to  assassinate the king? He’s not the only one who’s lost someone to the wrongdoings of His Majesty.”

“He didn’t give his name, just the job.”

“Forget it.” Storm said, her voice hard. “I took his job years ago and I never should have. Fucking around with Zodiac’s not a good idea.” She pointed to the scar that ran from her forehead to the bridge of her nose. “I almost died.”

“Hey, so did we.” Final chimed in.

“Lucky for us we didn’t get any ugly scars,” Snow said, receiving a cold glare from the Hybrid. She apologized quickly.”Sorry, sorry. I didn’t mean it.”

“Anyway, you guys can kindly fuck off now. I’m not overly fond of Demons and I don't want anything to do with Solstice and his shit.” she started to walk away.

Night was determined though, “I still have no idea who that is but this doesn’t have anything to do with him...well not really anyway. It’s a little something we want to do.”

“I don’t even know you guys, what could you possibly want with me?”

“To serve as a distraction of sorts. I have reason to believe that the king is hiding something vital in the castle. Could be something valuable, maybe worth stealing. He’s seen our faces though so if we go back he’ll catch on to us.”

“So what, he’s seen my face too.” Storm countered.

“But it’s less suspicious if you are the one he sees instead of us.”

Storm gave Night a very skeptical look. “So what you’re saying is you want me to fuck around with King Zodiac, the guy who almost killed me, so you guys can do who the hell knows in his castle?”

Snow answered before Night could, “Yes, that is exactly what he wants. Please do that.”

“You could also kill him if you want. That’s our original job anyway.” Night added.

“Okay, so if I were to say yes to this stupid ass request, what do I get in return?”

“Revenge? Half our profit? What do you want?”

“...Fine, but I’ll be taking 70 percent of your profit.” Before the three could protest Storm said, “Don’t worry. If this _is_ Solstice we’re talking about, he’ll have a lot more gold than he’s offering.”

 

\---

Nightfall once again and the mercenary trio found themselves back at King Zodiac’s castle, hiding in what was left of the forest, along with some extra company, Storm, and Solstice, a snow leopard Hybrid with gray hair streaked green, and silver eyes, forced to come along by the will of Storm King.

“I really don’t want to be here,” he spoke, “there’s a reason I pay other people to do this. I’m likely to die.”

Storm took the pleasure of responding, “Who cares? If you die, we’re still taking your money.”

“How will you get it if I’m dead? You don’t know where I keep it.”

Storm considered this. “Fine, I’ll keep you alive, but try not to be a _complete_ useless tool.”

Meanwhile Final, Night, and Snow were discussing what could hardly be considered a plan. “Okay, so from the information that Snow gathered, and from what I got through her constant laughter, Zodiac _does_ have something to hide. Unfortunately, there’s no way to know where to find it...so just look for a heavily guarded door.”

“How did you even find out he had some big secret anyway, Snow?” Final questioned.

“I get around. Found someone who used to be a guard for the royal family, who left because of all the _genocide_ , or whatever. He said a few years ago something went down and all of a sudden, guarding this door was a major priority.”

“Okay, that all sounds way too convenient but whatever, let’s just go.” Final said eventually.

Night sighed. “Just make sure you two don’t get caught. Final, do _not_ fucking take your scarf off. At. All.”

“Eh, I’ll think about it.”

“Hey, have a question,” Storms interrupted, “Yeah how exactly are we supposed to _know_ when you guys are finished in there?”

The three Demons exchanged glances at one another. “We didn’t think that far.” confessed Night.

“ _What?_ ” Storm snapped.

“How the fuck do you expect us to know when you three are done fucking around in there?!” Solstice inputted, just as angrily.

Night shrugged, “Just stall the king for two hours then leave.”

“Ha! If you think I’m fighting him for two hours, you’re nuts!” cried Storm. She motioned to Solstice. “This idiot will be long dead by then.”

“An hour?”

“Thirty minutes and we’re gone.” Solstice finalized.

Night released a low growl in his throat. “Fine. If we’re all alive we’ll meet up at my place. Snow, Final, let’s go. We need to move quickly.”

 

\---

 

Zodiac sighed. He didn’t know why he was expecting to get a good night’s rest tonight, but it was something that absolutely wasn’t happening. The knocking on the door of his actual chambers proved so. With great effort he threw on a black robe and responded to the annoying rapping, discovering that it had been one of his sentinels, knocking rapidly and horribly on his door. He literally hissed at the Demon, finding that he was to tired to give a proper response.

The Demon guard dropped to the ground and cowered in fear,stuttering out, “Y-your Majesty, I am dreadfully sorry, but it seems someone has climbed the tower, most likely intending to kill you sire.”

The dragon king nodded and proceeded to rip a hole into the guard’s stomach, still cranky from his rude awakening. He then went to find the other poor sap who wanted to die today. He exited through his window, flying to the tower, hoping all this would end soon so he could go back to sleep sooner.

Once he went into the tower he witness two intruders standing about. “Look, I’m tired so let’s make this quick.” He looked to Storm, recognizing her face. “You’ve come again? You truly are suicidal.”

“I’ve come for a rematch, my king. I’ve got some extra help too.”

Zodiac observed this “extra help”, sizing him up. _This child is nothing,_ he thought _, I had better end this quickly._ The king opened his mouth clearing his throat. Sparks of fire flew from his mouth, making Storm and Solstice step back. “Apologies it’s been awhile since I’ve done this,” He turned his head upward and coughed.

Storm, obviously having enough of whatever he was doing, stepped forward making out to tackle him down, but he quickly wrapped his tail around her body, entrapping the Hybrid. “Please,” he said, unimpressed. Strom struggled, but Zodiac just squeezed her harder. “I’m trying to make this quick for you. Would you rather I crush you to death?” He coughed a few more times. “Why isn’t this working?”

“Performance issues, aren't uncommon- arh!” Storm was cut off by yet another squeeze. “Solstice! Get your ass over here and do something!”

Zodiac eyed Solstice once more. “By all means try it. Hm?...I feel as though I have also seen you before as well...Ah yes, it wasn’t but a few years ago, during one of my raids.”

Solstice began to growl angrily. “Stop it…”

“You had a little sister did you not?”

“Shut up.”

Zodiac laughed, “Oh, and if I am not mistaken... I killed her.” Enraged, Solstice charged at him, baring fangs and claw, but Zodiac tossed Storm at him, knocking them both aside.

“Get it the fuck together, Solstice!” Storm ordered after she recovered.

“Sorry...I just got, angry.”

“Look if we’re gonna to have to cooperate if we wanna get outta here alive. So get your temper under control and start using your head.”

Solstice inhaled deeply, trying to calm himself “Alright.”

Zodiac watched them carefully “You two sound about done so-” a burst of flames flew from his mouth. Solstice and Storm rolled out of the way. The wardrobe and bed behind them caught fire.

“Okay,” Storm stood up along with Solstice. She cracked her neck and smiled. “Let’s do this.”

 

\---

 

“Fifteen minutes, we’ve got fifteen minutes.” Final said to himself. He was alone since he had split up with Snow and Night, but talking to himself gave him some comfort. “I’ve wasted half my time running around and I still haven’t found this dumb door. If it even exists.” He noticed some poor Demon woman turning a corner ahead of him. Final decided to follow, figuring there was nothing better for him to do. He kept a considerable amount of distance from her, noting that she could probably smell him if he got too close, if not already. Soon enough, the Demon had led him exactly where he wanted: a heavily guarded door.“I found it? I found it! I found it first too! Hell yeah!” he silently cheered but quickly got serious. He observed his surroundings.

The door itself was ebony, a bit larger than average, maybe around ten feet and, other than that, it didn’t look very special. There were ten guards, standing in a line in front of it. The female Demon was still approaching the door when one of the guards stepped forward and stopped her.

“Halt! Who goes?! This area is strictly prohibited to everyone.”

“I am Dream, um, His Majesty's... handmaid."

"What are doing here? Begone woman."

"I have special privilege from the king himself, to enter this room."

The guard laughed skeptically. "I highly doubt that the king has given a mere maid such permission."

Dream rose a brow. "Would you like to go and ask him yourself? Though I doubt he'll be happy about being awakened at this time late an hour."

"No need." The guard responded stubbornly. “Once again, please leave or I’ll have to resort to using force on you.” Dream was intrigued by this and waited to see what method of forced the Demon would use. When the guardsmen realized the she had no intention of leaving he sighed. “Very well then.”

It was then the guard decided it would be wise to change into his bestial Demon form to scare Dream off. The guards uniform tore away as he began to grow in size. He had gone from a regular Demon guard,to a gray, wolf-like beast, towering eight feet high. While Dream was overwhelmed by how large he grew, it couldn’t be said that she was scared, even with all of the ferocious growling the beast was letting off. The other guards, however, stepped back in fear. Two even ran. The Demon spoke, his voice was a loud booming sound and barely tolerable to Dream’s poor, highly sensitive, dog ears. “Impressive, eh? It’s hard for a Demon to transform, and even harder for them to control their beastial instincts. Now run off little maid, or you’ll find yourself in my belly.”

“No, the king definitely won’t be happy about that…” Dream muttered.

“Woman, why do you still linger? Do you _want_ be be devoured by me?”

“What would His Majesty say…?” after thinking about it, she exclaimed, “Ah, yes!” and pointed a confidant finger at the beast. “By all means, try it!”

Final, still watching from afar, had to wonder what was going through her head.

The beast roared angrily, “You will regret not taking up my kind offer!” His head turned to the guards behind him, bright, blood red eyes glowering at them all. “You lot, hold down this woman. I don’t like it when my prey runs away.”

The remaining six guards got themselves in some type of order, circling around Dream so she couldn’t escape. One grabbed her shoulders. “You’re such an idiot.” He told her.

Infuriated Dream cried,“Who the hell are you to tell me that?!” and rammed the back of her head into his face. The guard fell to the ground and Dream kicked him in the neck hard enough that the guard flew into the wall and slumped.

The other sentries stood in shock for a moment but soon after, attacked Dream as well. She easily dodged the sorry punches they were throwing her and swiped her claws against three of their faces. One guard tried to catch her off guard and swept his leg underneath Dream, however she easily jumped her it and side kicked his temple, knocking him unconscious instantly.

Seeing as his men were useless, the Demon beast stepped forward. With the swing of his arm, he knocked away the other watchmen, along with Dream. She rolled on the ground and slid to a halt.

“I’ll admit you put up a good fight, _handmaid,_ ” the beast’s voice resonated mockingly and it laughed. “However you are no match for me in this form.” His ears perked to the sound of Dream growling and he saw that the girl’s eyes had turned from their natural brown to the same blood red as his were. “Getting angry are we? Careful, don’t want to lose your head.”

“You aren’t the only here who can transform, idiot!” she spat and almost immediately morphed into a giant, dog-like beast, only a few feet smaller than the beast before her.

“Impressive, but it’s-”  he was cut off, Dream was in front of the beast before he realized. “How did you-!?”

“You waste a lot of time bragging like that.” she stated and her teeth ripped into the beast’s throat, ripping out, not holding back a bit. After she was done maiming the former guardsmen, she looked back to the other’s that remained but it seemed they had all run off. “Good.” Dream licked her bloodied chops and continued to the inner chamber. “Was it so hard to just let me through? Hold on…” she sniffed the air and caught the scent of an intruder. “Who is there!? I smell you Demon!”

Final froze. _Oh, fuck!_ He was happy she got rid of all the guards, but he didn’t want to die as well.

“How did you get in here, Demon?”

Final noticed her voice sounded infinitely more closer than it had a few moments ago. He looked up and saw Dream’s red eyes glaring at him, her body poised for attack. _Oh, fuck me!_

“I won’t ask again, Demon? Would you like to leave alive?”

“Uh, I think I got lost?” Was Final’s clever response.

“Hmph. I guess not.” she lunged at the boy and to her surprise, her snout was clamped shut. _This boy can do this with his bare hands!?_

Meanwhile Final was just as shocked- because he wasn’t dead yet; but more or less he snapped out of his shock and tossed Dream over his head, as if she didn’t weigh any more than paper. “Okay, nice talking to you!” he made a break for the chamber. Just as he was a few feet within range of opening the  door, Dream’s giant bestial body covered the entrance. She swiped at claw at him and hit air.

Final had jumped back to avoid being hit. “How do you move so fast?” he wondered. The answer was another attempt on his life.

“Why do you know about this room? Who told you about them!?” Dream bellowed.

“ _Them?_ So what, there are a couple of jewels or something in there? I don’t actually know anything about what’s in there or why  we’re taking them. This is all Night’s stupid idea. I honestly don’t even know what he’s after.”

“ _Take them?_ ” this seemed to strike a nerve in Dream. She lost all her senses and released a barrage of attacks against Final, clawing and chomping at him angrily.

“Oh? Looks like she’s lost it- ah!” Final yelped as Dream caught him in her mouth, intending to swallow him whole but Final resisted, holding open her mouth with both hands. “Look, I’m pretty sure I don’t taste that good.” Dream threw her head about violently and Final knew then that his words were lost on her. She had given in to her anger and lost all reason. “Fine.” he brought down up a leg to kick one of Dream’s canine’s, easily breaking , and grabbing it with his foot. “I’m kind of sorry about this...not really.” Final stabbed the fang into Dream’s tongue. Her horrid screech allowed him to jump out of her mouth and safely onto the ground.

Once again, Final ran toward the door. Dream’s snarling had him stop and turn back around. The sight of her red eyes and muzzle dripping bloody saliva did not sit well with him. And when she started running full toward him, he could say he was a bit uneasy. “You really don’t want to do that.” he asked. It seemed her speed only increased. “Okay…” Final waited until the last moment to jump out of the way, leaving Dream to run into the door hard, knocking it down and her unconscious. “I told you.”

“Final!”

The redhead looked up, seeing both Night and Snow at the end of the hall and now jogging toward him. “Yeah, it only took you guys like for fucking ever to get here. Way to show up when I’m done.”

“Hey, don’t get snippy, we tried to come as fast as possible after we heard all the growling and screaming!” Snow retorted, “ _Some_ of us weren’t born with feet built for running.”

“Get over it, Snow! We do a lot of that, and that’s not changing anytime soon.”

The fight had just begun, but Night was already done. He let out a loud roar at both of them, “Will you guys shut the fuck up! We have about five minutes to grab what’s in there and leave!”

Snow back down, “Hey, don’t kill us or anything...your eyes are red.”

“You two are testing my goddamn patience.” Night said, but regardless tried his best to soothe his temper. “Let’s just grab it and go.”

The three quickly agreed and hurried through the door, crossing over Dream’s unconscious beast body in the process. Inside the room was a bit of a surprise. There weren’t jewels sitting upon a fancy pedestal and it wasn’t a room filled with gold from the floor to the ceiling. Instead the room was carpeted, a weird change considering most of the flooring in the castle was stone or wood. The walls were painted with various animals, mostly dragons. In the far back of the room there were two crib looking objects. Final walked back there, observing the spinning devices overhead one of the cribs. He toyed with them a bit. “Are these...mobiles?”

Snow observed the walls and stuffed animal toys laying about. “This room kinda looks like a nursery.”

Final looked down and his eyes widened. “Um...about that.”

Night came up from behind him looking into both cribs and then turned away. “What did I say. Grab them and let’s go.”

Snow giggled. “Cool! I’ve always wanted to try kidnapping.”

 


	3. Chapter 3

They don’t remember how but at some point, Solstice and Storm ended up outside, in the burnt down forest. Zodiac was overhead shooting balls of fire at them because it wasn’t like the forest could burn down anymore than it already had.

“Okay!” Storm said jumping out of the way of a particularly huge ball of fire. “I think we’re just about finished here. Let’s go!” she motioned to Solstice that is was now time to run away. He followed her, while evading the flames being shot at him.

“Running away, are we? What cowards you two turned out to be. I thought you wanted revenge!” Zodiac flew to them, obstructing their path. “I almost want to spare your lives.” Solstice, thinking fast, kicked a bunch of ash into Zodiac’s face, then he and Storm made their escape. The dragon Demon was left coughing and rubbing his eyes. “I cannot believe he just kicked ash in my face. What have I become? Surely, something less than a king.” He coughed hard and was taken aback by the stream of light that flew from his mouth. “Ah! My lightning! You have come back to me!” Zodiac smiled deviously.

He took pleasure in flying back up to the two Hybrids. “Hello, yes, remember earlier when I was coughing and nothing happened. This is what was supposed to happen.” with another coughing motion, a bolt of lightning was shot at Storm. At the same time Solstice looked back,seeing the bolt, and jumped into Storm. They fell to the ground, rolling in ash.

“What the bloody fuck! Is that lightning? He can shoot lightning!?” Storm cried hysterically.

“Apparently so. I believe that is how he intended to kill us earlier.” Solstice responded.

“No. No! We’re getting out of here now!” she jumped out the way of yet another stream of lightning. “We need to slow him down. Incapacitate him somehow.”

“You think he’ll slow down if I shove a bunch of ash down his throat?” Solstice suggested.

Ignoring what he said, Storm asked in a low voice, “Is there any water or some metal around here? Maybe we can get him to electrocute himself somehow?”

Solstice thought about this while keeping on eye on Zodiac, now circling back toward them. “I believe I saw a fountain out here. In the garden? If I remember correctly-” they jumped and rolled out the way together as more lightning was shot at them. “- I saw the garden was about five minutes from here.”

“Lead, the way!” Storm told him.

The two managed to avoid the streams of lightning flying at them and made it to the garden fountain. It was made of a white stone and, as to be expected shaped into a long dragon; the body formed the outer ringlets of the water basins and the head spouted water upward from the top.

“Now what?” Storm asked.

Solstice said simply, “We break it.”

“With what?” As soon as the words left her mouth, Solstice eyed the king, ready to shoot another mouthful of lightning at them. “Ooh, I got ya.”

The strong burst of energy, once  again missed Solstice and Storm and instead easily destroyed the fountain. It shattered into pieces, stone flew in every which way, cutting not only the two Hybrids, but Zodiac as well. Sharpened stones flew right through his wings. A particular huge piece of stone managed to clonk him in the head and he dropped from the sky into the garden. Water was now rapidly flooding the garden, overflowing stone pavement and grass alike , and rising to the ankles of both Storm and Solstice.

The two watched to their dismay as Zodiac rose, and hand to his now bleeding temple. His wings furrowed out  and the king saw that they looked less like his mighty dragon wings and more like swiss cheese.“You two are so much trouble. Why won’t you just die!?” His hands slammed into the water beneath him and for a moment, Zodiac resembled a small child having a tantrum. He noticed, somehow his head felt a lot lighter than it did a few moments ago. _Was is from being hit in the head? No…_

His head came up to the top of his head, and further, and then...nothing. “Noo…,” Zodiac moaned, “No, no, no, no!” His neon yellow eyes went red instantly. “You two will pay for the loss of my wings and my remaining horn!”

“Get up on what’s left of the fountain and don’t move no matter what!” Solstice ordered quickly and engaged in battle with the king.

Storm protested.“Why? What’re-”

“Just do it!” Solstice yelled. Reluctantly Storm did as told and watched Solstice dodge and weave all of Zodiac’s jabs, though not for long.  Eventually he had a firm grip on Solstice’s neck and slammed him into the flooded ground, still holding tightly onto his neck.

“Please, no lightning!”

“ _No lightning!?”_ Zodiac hissed, barely sounding sane, and didn’t help that he began to laugh maniacally. Then, the bright white light formed in his mouth.

Solstice knew he couldn’t avoid the blast from such a close range and he inwardly groaned. _This is going to hurt a lot._

 

Storm witnessed it all. She saw the lightning that Zodiac was readying and how Solstice gave up, knowing he couldn't escape. She almost went to help him. _Almost._

At the last moment, Solstice had brought his arms up, turning Zodiac's head to the side. The lightning struck the water and immediately, both Solstice and Zodiac began to convulse violently as the shock traveled through their bodies.

Once the their seizing had ceased, Storm took a cautious step into the water. Deciding it was safe enough, she pulled Solstice out from underneath Zodiac, who had fallen on top of him after the whole ordeal. Solstice’s eyes and nose were bleeding, prompting Storm to check his pulse, and see if he was still alive.

“Just barely…” She said to herself. There was a faint beating. She would say it was pretty strong after being electrocuted so thoroughly. After confirming his state, she hoisted Solstice over her shoulder. If Solstice was alive, the king definitely had to be and Storm wasn’t dealing with that. She made out to leave this place, and hopefully, never come back.

 

\---

It had been a long way back. The afternoon sun had just begun to shine and that was Night’s cue to drop dead in his bed. Soft pillows and warm blankets had him purring happily. It was much more prefered than everything that had happened the past 2 days. He had practically fallen asleep, but a horrid crying ruined everything. “Shut it up!”

“Here’s an idea,” Final said, “Why don’t we return them?”

“We went through a lot of trouble to get those kids.”

Final laughed, “I think you mean _I_ went through a lot of trouble.”

“Whatever just shut whichever one is crying up!”

Snow, who was actually trying to do just that because somehow, both children were given to her, told him, “You yelling isn’t helping, Night,” she gave attention to what appeared to be the youngest children- merely a Demon baby,close to three months. “This poor little baby probably misses its mommy, who is, judging by the scent...that Demon Final killed.”

“I don’t think she’s dead. Also isn’t that the king’s child as well. That female Demon was apparently a maid. What’s he doing messing around with her?”

“Maybe he has a thing for maids,” Night said, “she can’t be the only one His Majesticness has fucked around with.”

“No,” Snow sniffed the other Demon child, who seemed to be not much older than the other, “this one is her’s too.”

Night once again insisted, “She’s probably his favorite.”

FInal doubted this. “I don’t think so. When I was...eavesdropping I guess, she sounded like she was pretty close to Zodiac. I think she might be like the queen or something!”

“Zodiac isn’t married.” Night said.

“How the hell would you know?” Final rebutted.

“Wouldn’t we have heard about that?”

“Just like we heard about his fucking _kids?_ ”

Night went silent, mostly because he was far too tired to argue. The only sound left were that of Snow talking to the children in a baby voice. "Are you crying because miss your mommy? I'm sure she misses you too."

"Maybe it's hungry?" Final proposed.

"Oh right,  I guess these things need sustenance. What do dragons eat?"

“I would think meat…Can infant Demons even eat that? I know human babies can’t eat solid foods until they’re like a year old or something, but I don’t know anything about Demons.”

“I give up,” Snow passed the babies to Final, “I’m out.”

“Where the hell are you going?” Final shouted, but Snow had already left the building. Needing someone to  lash out at, Final turned to Night. “Oye, you, why did we take these stupid kids?” But Night didn’t hear him. Night was sound asleep. “Fuck you both.”

 

\---

“What do you want? Haven’t you heard? His Royal Highness is-” Dream grabbed the medic Demon’s face and slammed it against the wall. Maybe there was a time where Dream would have listened to what the poor Demon had to say instead of acting so rashly, but after that whole ordeal last night, she wasn’t in the mood.

She walked into the room and saw three other medical assistants around their unconscious king, one checking his pulse and cleaning blood from his body, the other two stitching the various holes in his wings, however they weren’t even half way through most of the holes. The nurse cleaning Zodiac’s wounds stopped and turned to Dream, while the other two restlessly continued to stitch up Zodiac’s wings.

“You...you’re the Demon we found lying in front of the inner chambers. What do you want? Shouldn’t you be imprisoned? After all it was you who infiltrated the inner chambers. I’m sure someone other than the king can put you down.”

Dream put a hand to her temple in frustration.

“Ah, right, you cannot speak right now, lest you wish to reopen your injury. Maybe you can just gesture what you want.” he joked.

That would take too long, so Dream simply tossed the nurse outside, he was getting annoying anyway. The other two assistance trembled in fear, but Dream motioned for them to continue their stitch job. She, however, attempted to wake Zodiac.

“I would not advise waking him. His Majesty needs all the rest he can get,” one of the medics spoke.

Dream considered this before she gave Zodiac a good waking slap. She stepped back from his lashing out; the two medics steered clear of the king thrashing about. Once Zodiac calmed he noticed Dream, taking in that she had bandages wrapped around her head. He began to ask what happened to her but, to his surprised, she screamed at him one, blood filled sentence.

“ ** _Bring back my children!_** ”

 

\---

Snow would quickly admit that seeing Night in such a manner was a bit of a shock. Definitely unexpected. It seemed Final had turned in for the day, sleeping where Night once was. One of the babies- the youngest-  had also fallen asleep, resting soundly next to Final. Night, on the other hand, was crouched down on the floor with the other child. Snow realized he was playing with the little one, batting one of his paws around while the child attempted to grabbed it.

“You’re going to have to try harder than that,” Night cooed.

Snow wasn’t planning on interrupting since Night seemed to be enjoying himself, based on his purring, but the dragon kid had swiped a claw at his hand adding a tiny, “Raaawr!” that Snow couldn’t help but giggle.

Startled, Night’s head quickly turned in her direction, his purring stopped and fur now bristled to a point. “God damn it Snow!”

“Sorry, sorry,” she managed to get out. She had gone from giggling softly to laughing hard  at Night’s reaction. “I wasn’t trying scare you- oh my god!” She fell to her knees trying to catch her breath. “You’re such a fraidy cat- hahahaha!”

Night scowled. “Where’ve you been anyway? It’s been like five hours since you left.” He eyed the brown paper bag she was holding. “And what’s that?”

“Well originally I left to get food for those guys, but then I was like I have no idea what dragon’s eat. So then I went to the library and-”

Night cut in, “This town doesn’t even have a library.”

“I went to a bookstore then- to see if there was anything on dragons. But then I got a little too into it and ended up buying a whole bunch of books on Demons and dragons. I learned a lot though- like how we’re called _Demons_ because unlike Hybrids, we can transform and our eyes turn red, which apparently are how demon's eyes from ancient folktales were depicted.”

Night wanted to say something snarky- he really did, but Snow just seemed so satisfied with her lesson that he couldn't do it. "Okay." He said awkwardly, not knowing what else he could have done.

"Wanna hear more?" She asked excitedly.

"Um, maybe later?" He told her, distracted by the child the was now toying with his tail. Snow pouted. "Anyway, about the food. We fed them.They're both able to eat meat. Even though they're like toddlers or whatever, they have a full set of teeth." A sharp pain to his tail made Night yowl loudly. He snatched the kid up in one arm. "A full set of sharp ass teeth."

"I read about this too. Demon and Hybrid offspring tend to develop faster than human ones,though that’s kind of obvious. We’re part animal."

".........More importantly, Storm and Solstice, have you seen them? They still haven't made it back here." Night set down the child carefully.

Snow laughed, “If they still aren’t back now, they’re probably dead.” She began to laugh harder. “Maybe they got lost on the way back! That’d be rich!”

“Will you shut the fuck up? Can’t you see Final and the other kid are trying to sleep? I’ll be damned if that brat wakes up-!” but just after he finished, the Demon child did indeed wake up, screaming loudly. “Ugh, I’m sick of it. It was crying for hours after you left. Interrupted my damn sleep. We finally got it to shut up, then you had to come in with your giggling…”

“I’m telling you, maybe it just wants its mother,” Snow went over to the child, picking it up and cradling it, “There, there, little one…You know _it_ is a girl?”

“You know I don’t care?”

Snow shrugged, “I’m just telling you because it seems kinda harsh that we keep calling her an _it_ \- it’s okay shh shhh. I’m sorry your mommy’s not here but I’m sure she will be eventually and we’ll all be dead by then because your daddy’s gonna kill us for taking you in the first place,” Night was surprised that crying was stopping. “Yeah! You like the thought of us being dead don’t you? You’re daddy’s gonna come and burn us alive!” Snow stopped  when she looked up and saw Night giving her an odd look. “What?”

“Nothing. Whatever, it- sorry _she_ shut up and that’s good enough for me.”

“Night, why’d we take these damn kids anyway?”

Night ran a paw through his long ass hair, “I dunno. Leverage?”

“Leverage?” repeated Snow.

“To use against the king. You know, tell him to step down from the throne and exile himself far away or we throw the kids off a cliff.”

Snow turned away slightly, unconsciously clutching the child in her arms a bit tighter. “How cruel!”

“Not to mention incredibly stupid,” Final inputted. He sat up, stretching out his arms over his head.

Night narrowed his eyes at the boy. “I thought you were sleeping.”

“I was,” Final answered while yawning, “but the kid’s crying woke me up. Anyway, Night, out of all the underdeveloped plans you’ve had, this one is the most least thought out one yet.”

“Whatever.”

“It’s not even a matter of _whatever._ That is literally your dumbest idea ever! Not only could Zodiac fly and rescue his kids, if we were to throw them off a cliff or something, but whether we do or don’t do that, he’d probably just get angry and kill us along with everyone else in range.”

Snow said, “I dunno, he might stop. I mean, what parent wouldn’t give up everything for their children?”

Final ignored her, “And then there’s the mother,” he shivered remembering her ferocity, “she’ll definitely fuck us up before we do anything to them.”

"I'm also kinda against throwing kids off a cliff." Snow admitted.

"But not kidnapping?" Final said, receiving a shrug in response. “Anyway, the point is that you,” Final pointed directly at Night, “better improve your shitty plan before we get ourselves killed.”

Night rolled his eyes and Snow laughed. “Hehe! How sad is it that you’re being lectured by Final?”

 

Night was about to say something, but was interrupted by the door bursting open. In came Storm, who was carrying Solstice on her back. She immediately collapsed on the floor upon entry.

“Oh, so you two are alive,” Snow stated, “Wait, wait, wait. Tell me...did you guys get lost?”

“What the hell happened to you two?” Night asked, crouching down to make sure they were both still living.

Storm sputtered, “We fought the fucking king- what the hell do you think happened!?” She moved to sit on her knees. “DId you know that our king can shoot _lightning_ out of his mouth, yeah? Solstice here experienced it first hand.”

“Oh? But you two made it back alive sooo...” NIght said.

“Yeah, barely!”Storm shouted. “Solstice managed to get the king to electrocute himself, but he was caught in it too. Once the king was out, I grabbed him and ran the fuck out of there!”

Night nodded along, not really interested in her sob story, until the last part hit him. “Wait, what? The king was _unconscious?”_

Storm answered, “Yeah, I mean I don’t know too many people who stay conscious after being bloody fucked up with lightning.”

“What did you do after he passed out?” Night asked firmly.

Storm gave him an annoyed look. “Didn’t I just say I ran the fuck...away...oh fuck me.”

Night let out a lengthy sigh and pinched the bridge of his nose, taking a short walk out of the room.

Final looked confused, “I’m sorry, what’s the problem here?”

“She left the king there, Final,” Snow responded.

“She had the perfect opportunity to kill the king,” Night said angrily as he returned back to the scene, “and she didn’t take it.”

“Oh bugger the fuck off mate. I did my part. What the hell did you three do?” Storm eyes darted from the child crawling on the floor, occasionally toying with Night’s tail, to the child Snow was holding, just now aware of their presence. “What’s the deal with the kids?”

“They are what we found,” Snow told her, “This was the big secret that Zodiac had stowed away in the depths of his castle. His kids.”

“You,” Storm’s eye twitched, “you _took_ his kids?” she laughed nervously. “We’re dead. We are all going to die.”

“You know,” Night began, “we probably wouldn’t if you had killed Zodiac when you had the chance.”

“Oh lay off Night,” Final snapped, “you’re not that better off than she is. Why don't you come up with a better plan so we least have a chance when Zodiac comes to kill us."        
                                               
                Night left the room once more, grumbling angrily to himself.  
                              
                "Well on the bright side, it might be a while before he actually _does_ come to murder us  all," Storm said, "We did rough him up a bit. Especially his wings." she nodded to herself. "Yeah, he probably won't be flying for a while."     
  
                "Oh good," Snow said happily, "See I read that it takes a long time for the wings of a dragon to heal. Depending on how serious the injury, it could take months maybe even a year for it to heal.” she looked down the kid in her arms and cooed, “Sorry little one, looks like your daddy won’t be here after all.”  
  
                "Well at least one of the three of you is doing something useful." Storm commented and Snow beamed. "By the way, do you have any place I can put him?" she motioned toward the unconscious Solstice. "Can't have him dying since he has all the gold...and I suppose he did save my life."  
        
                Snow  pointed at the hall to her left. "Down there, there's a room full of beds. You could put him in there." She then muttered, "You know instead of an actual hospital or something." She was sure Storm heard her but the Hybrid showed no signs of acknowledgment.

She followed Snow’s directions and shortly came back, announcing, “Well, I’m going home. Hopefully I won’t have to see you _Demons_ again. I doubt it though…” and with that Storm was gone.

Final crawled out of the bed, stretching out all his limbs as he made his way to the door outside. “I’m out too. Later, Snow.”

“Huh? Where are you going?”

“I haven’t been home in a few days- and I know Harmony is there but Rem’s probably worried sick.”

“Oh, you’re right. I guess we have been pretty busy getting our asses beat.” Snow rambled on, now talking mostly to herself, “I could go home, though I don’t think Hale’s particularly worried about me. I suppose I could check.”

“Are you two finally leaving my life?” NIght’s question broke into their conversation.

“Oh looks like the Grumpy Cat is finished having a temper tantrum.” Snow said laughing hard afterward.

“Hey speaking of siblings, don’t you have a sister Night?” asked Final.

“Yes, Day. She’s my twin. You both have seen her.”

“What?” Snow exclaimed, “I have?”

“Gonna say I don’t quite remember this either.” Final admitted.

“Yeah, it was like a last night, when we were bar hopping, looking for Storm. She works at one of those bars. Don’t you remember she was like ‘ _do you guys want a drink?’_ and then we all shook our heads and I said, ‘ _later Day’_ and she waved.”

FInal responded, “What the hell, that was your sister? I thought you just showed up there a lot and made a girlfriend or something. She doesn’t even look like you! In fact I thought she was a Hybrid.” To Final’s surprised, Night answered with a laugh. “What?”

Still laughing he replied with, “You said _girlfriend_.” Then, of course Snow joined in because she could never turn down a chance to laugh obnoxiously.

Final got fed up with the two of them. “...Alright, I’m leaving now,” he told them quickly, exited the house before things got more annoying.

Snow’s laughter died down. “Yeah, I’m gonna head out too. I actually kinda miss Hale. Also,” Snow snatched up the other dragon kid from the floor. “I’m taking these. I don’t trust you.”

“Whatever, good riddance.” Night said.

“Oh yeah, don’t forget, Solstice is unconscious in one of your beds.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

 


	4. Chapter 4

Two weeks had passed. Dream was sitting on the floor alone. She was supposed to be cleaning. Well she was supposed to be doing a lot of things over the past two weeks, but those tasks were either abandoned or done half heartedly. Demon guards of all sort yelled at her, which she probably deserved. The male Demons tried to strike her for neglecting her work so she broke their arms, and maybe a few other limbs just because they deserved it. Maybe Zodiac had been a bad influence on her but who could blame her?

It had been two whole weeks and yet Dream’s darling children had not been returned to her. She wasn’t going to blame anyone but herself. Maybe she should have figured out that something was going on the night they were taken. Maybe she should have kept her cool when fighting that Demon...Yes, that was definitely it. Had she been calmer she probably would not have dived head first into that stupid door!

The mere thought of that whole ordeal made her temple ache.

“Maid, what do you think you are doing?” Dream sighed. Sounded like another victim was asking to be broken.

She turned to the new voice that interrupted her self loathing. “What?”

“Why aren’t you cleaning? The king would burn you to a crisp for such a misdemeanor!”

“No, he wouldn’t. There are plenty of maids to spare. Someone else can take care of this.”

“What is this insolence? I will put you in your place woman!” the Demon brought back his hand but it never made contact with Dream’s face. She caught it and stood up. “Arg! You shall be imprisoned for this disruptive behavior.”

“I don’t understand why you dumb guards want to hit on us maids, especially me.”

“Unhand me maid!” He screamed when Dream twisted his hand far too much for his liking before letting go. “You wench! I will have you arrested. You should pray His Majesty should come and put you out of your misery before you face such hell.”

Dream gave the Demon a curious look.“Honestly, I twisted your hand and you are still back talking me? I can see why Zodiac kills all of you without hesitation.”

The Demon sputtered, “Who are you to address the king so informally!”

“Who am I?...To be honest, with how he treats me, I’m something like the queen.” She thought on it. “You know what? Screw it-” she turned and ripped the guard’s throat out, recalling that Zodiac mentioned throat-ripping was one of his favorite way to murder. The Demon’s body hit the ground and Dream laughed to herself. “I am the queen.”

Yes, Zodiac was quite a bad influence on her.

\--

Dream had walked to the medical quarters to check on Zodiac's condition and try to wake him again. Heaven knows that slap she gave him the first time didn't work, but Zodiac was fairly out of it then.   
It was quite shocking when Dream found the king conscious and ripping all sorts of cords from his body.

"You're awake...!" she exclaimed and Zodiac's head snapped in her direction. His eyes glowing bright and angry. Dream took a step back, frightened by his glare.

"What am I doing here?" he finally asked. The red in his eyes faded after realizing that it was Dream in front of him.

"You haven't completely forgotten everything have you?"      

"...As of now, I can only recall you slapping me. You were...also injured too if I remember correctly." He observed her face. "You have a few more scars on your face than I last remember."

Dream sighed and sat down in the bed with him. She.explained what had happened that night after he went comatose.                      

"So then Astro and Lian...!"

Dream lowered her head. "They were taken..."

Zodiac gritted his teeth and his wings furled open in a flash.

Dream grabbed his arm hurriedly before he could jump out the nearest window. "Where are you going?"

"What do you think? I'm going to kill whoever took our girls!"    

"But your wings are damaged,you can't fly!"      

"Then I will go there on foot!"      

"No!"

Zodiac narrowed his eyes in confusion "No?"

"I-I don't want you to go."

"Dream do you hear yourself?"

"I don't want you to get hurt Zodiac. You were out for two weeks, and I know your body can heal quickly, but still. it doesn't make me any less worried about you."

Zodiac calmed. “What do you propose I do then, Dream?”

“Can’t you get someone else to do it? I mean, you are the king. Don’t you have a personal knight to do your dirty work?”

“No, because I am more of a hands on kind of Demon,” Zodiac considered her suggestion a moment, “Although, there is one amongst my guards who may fit what you are looking for. He accompanied me during my raids. He did an exceptional job extinguishing the Hybrids. It appeared to me that he simply enjoyed killing others.”

“Perfect,” Dream said, “I want the Demons who took our daughters to burn.”

”Just a reminder that I could do that myself.”

“No, I want you to recover. Now where can I find this Demon?”

Zodiac shrugged and Dream thought it had to be the most casual and informal thing he had ever done. “I do not keep track of my guards. I am more akin to killing them. However, I believe his name is Risai.”

“Good, I’ll ask around for him.”

“Dream...I love you dearly, but you are a mere maid. Those fools will not hear you out. And I would be more than willing to go in your stead however you are so adamant about me regaining my strength.”

She agreed. “It’s true. They won’t listen to me as a maid,” she rose from the bed and headed out the door saying, “but maybe they’ll listen to me as  the queen.”

\--

"I'll ask again, where's Risai?" Dream was, as she said before trying to find Risai. She made her way to the guards quarters because that made the most sense. Currently had one of the lesser important guards in a headlock since he refused to talk. “You will answer to the queen.”

“He- he’s in there!” He pointed to a black door further into the quarters. “However, I’ve heard he doesn’t like-uh, people. I don’t know! I’ve never actually met him!”

“Thank you. That will be all.” Dream dropped the guard and proceeded through the door. She didn’t even bother knocking. Inside the room was very homely; A small table, complemented with a rug; a few bookshelves-stuffed full of books of all sorts. No bed though...

It looked to Dream that the Demon named Risai wasn’t in the room. That idiotic guard! Probably trying to get rid of me quickly-

Dream’s thoughts were interrupted when something- a person- dropped in front of her. He was a few inches taller than her, with long, messy, black hair, held in place by five golden hair clips. He looked to be a mix of a fox bat and a tiger. At first Dream was wary of his glare but almost immediately the Demon smiled cheekily at her.

“Hello, there.”

“H-hello,” Dream said a bit disoriented by the greeting. “Are you Risai?”

“That I am. And who might you be milady?”

By habit, Dream almost introduced herself as a maid, but she quickly recovered, however for some reason it didn't come out as confidently as she wanted it to. "I-I am the queen..."  
"Oh? Well, I guess I must have missed the wedding."  
"Uh, right. Anyway, I have a request."  
"Ooh, a request from the queen, how exciting."  
There was something in the tone of his voice that Dream didn’t like and she was starting to regret this. "This is highly confidential though so I can't have you telling anyone about this."  
"I assure you, Your Highness, my lips are sealed."                                   
"Right." She definitely didn't trust him. "Something of great importance was stolen. I ask that you retrieve...them."  
"More than one?"  
Dream was hesitant to answer, "Yes."

“Hm..." Risai began to walk circles around Dream. "You aren't giving me a lot of information to work with," he added as an afterthought, "Your Highness. How am I supposed to retrieve your stolen items without knowing who took them or what they are?" he stopped behind Dream and draped an arm over her right shoulder,the attached wing draping over as well, whispering closely in her ear. "Won't you tell me my queen?"    
Dream shivered in disgust. "No. This was a mistake." she peeled Risai's arm from her shoulder. "I'm sorry to have troubled you."   
Dream made out to leave but Risai caught her hand, twisting it and pinning her up against the door. She struggled, trying to hit him with her free hand, however Risai caught it as well and pinned it above her.   
I still have my legs  
But as if reading her mind Risai told her, "Ah, ah, you might lose a limb if you try something else."  
Well she didn't want that. The only way out of this seemed to be transforming, but Dream thought of how well that turned out last time and thought the better of it. So she submitted.

"Good girl. Now let me tell you something. I don't really like...well anyone, and I especially hate it when people personally come and bother me. I usually kill whoever does me but you're a pretty little thing, so I'll make a few accommodations.

God, this could have been easily avoided had Dream sent someone else. She needed to act like the queen she claimed to be.

Risai continued, "I've been cooped up in this castle with nothing much to do. The other guards are stupid and dull, and of course killing them is just as boring. So I can take this request of yours and bring back your whatevers safely, as well as let you live, or I could just kill you now. Take your pick."

Dream thought it was stupid. Why couldn't he just leave the castle himself? Maybe he didn't have a reason to until now? Everything was so stupid but Dream didn't want to die and she wanted to see her babies alive and well- if they even were still alive. Arg dammit! "My children..."     

"What's that?"                      

"My children were taken."

Risai released Dream, "Really? Children? Plural? You and the king? Where did you find the time- how was this even covered up?" After realizing she wasn't going to respond, Risai reared back to her request . "And do you know where they have gone?"  

"If I did, I don't think I would have consulted with you!"

"No need for such a cruel tone Your Highness."

"Will you find them or not?" Dream bit out.

"Of course. You may think me distrustful but I am a Demon of my word. I just need a scent or such to point me in the right direction."

"If you intend to track them by scent then you're useless to me. You think I haven't tried that already?"

"Of course dearie," Risai patted her face and Dream considered biting off his wing/hand, "But there were many factors that could have covered their scent like the weather or all the ash in the air from when His Majesty decided to set the forest on fire. Plus it's been quite a while since they were taken, yes? So maybe it's possible that the combination of my flight and sense of smell can find something your sense of smell could not find on foot."

Though Dream didn't want to admit it, he had a point. But even if he was able to locate her children somehow, she really did not want him near them. However she knew, by this point, if she refused Risai’s services, he was quite ready to kill her.

Dream sighed. “Very well. Follow me.”

\--  
  


It amazed Risai that he could find out where these thieves were hiding so quickly- and so close to the castle! On foot it might have taken a few days to find it but, with his flight, it took him half a day, maybe a bit more. What he found was a town, and while it was well hidden by forest trees and placed deep inside a crevice, Risai honestly believed that anyone could find it if they tried hard enough. It wasn’t like the people bustling in and out of the town were being discreet about it. Risai assumed they were fairly certain the king wouldn’t find them,and he thought so far they were correct. He supposed the hiding in plain sight strategy was working out well enough for them anyway.

Trying to get back on track, Risai took out a small toy dragon plushie, taking a small, careful whiff, trying not to draw much attention to himself. The scent of these children was very strong in this town...and coming from three separate directions. The sky was already darkening quickly so he decided he'd follow the closest one, not wanting to waste anymore time.

 

“Might as well let myself in.” Risai said to himself and casually broke down the door. Empty and desolate were the first words that came to Risai’s head as he half expected to hear a crying baby or the god awful sound of children screaming. Or even someone charging at him in attack, but no, that wasn’t the case. Carefully he searched every plausible area of the house. The scent of the children lingered practically everywhere so it wasn’t as if his nose was going to be a big help. After a while, Risai realized it had gone completely dark and he needed to get a move on. He prepared himself to leave but saw a closed door out of the corner of his eye. Somehow he had not yet checked it. Wanting to make this quick, Risai scurried to the door an opened it without hesitation. He however, was not expecting something to push him back with such a force.

He looked up to see a Demon- Night- who Risai found rather handsome, standing in the doorframe. Risai quickly identified him as the force that had hit him. “Oh so someone is here after all. That’s a relief I was getting bored.”

“At first I thought you were a regular thief so I was deciding whether or not I should have confronted you or not because it’s not like I have anything worth stealing. But you looked like you were looking for something specific so I was in here trying to figure out what.”

Risai was curious, “How could you have possibly seen me from in here?”

“I can see heat.” Night stated simply. “Anyway I’m assuming you were sent by the king? He’s got good taste sending someone as pretty as you.”

“Yes...well, sort of. Not really. No. You see the ‘queen’ sent me. ”

“Hm,” Night hummed not really caring. He figured he would catch Risai off guard with the question went for a blow to the other Demon’s stomach, however Risai swiftly avoided the attack and successfully kneed Night’s chin. He stumbled a moment but recovered easily, managing to scratch one of Risai’s wings. This however was not going to be enough to stop the murderous Demon. Night swiped a leg under Risai’s feet with the intent to trip him. Risai jumped and blew Night back with a mighty beat of his wings. Then before Night could even think about trying something else, Risai grabbed his shoulders and slammed Night up against the nearest wall.

With a grunt and a roll of his hips Night said to him, “Up against the wall? I like it.” he seemed satisfied when Risai face twitched a smirk  “You know it’s pretty pointless for us to be fighting. I don’t even have the kids.”

“I have made the connection. However, I was informed to end the lives of the kidnappers and killing is what I do best.”

“Aren’t you at least going to interrogate me? If you kill me now you won’t be able to find them.”

“I have their scent.” Risai said.

Frustrated that his attempt at negotiating his life didn’t work- not that he was going to sell out those two idiots anyway- Night bit Risai’s hand, causing the other to drawback.

“Ow! You son of a bitch!” cried Risai

“Oh, you didn’t like that? Pity I thought you’d like it a little rough.”

“Shut the hell up! You aren’t venomous are you?”

“Wouldn’t you like to know.” Night answered and tackled him onto the floor.

Now Risai was getting all flirtatious, “My, my, I thought the floor would be a bit uncomfortable for our first time.”

Night enjoyed his commentary but he didn’t hesitate slamming Risai’s head into the floor, then shortly after, headbutting him as hard as he could. Nothing like a good concussion to destroy your enemies. He rose an arm, preparing to rip a hole in his throat, but Risai caught it and threw Night away from him. No later did he grab Night, this time by the neck, and once again had him restrained against the wall.

“Didn’t we already try this position?” Night asked.

“Yes, well it’s seems like it’s the only way I can get you to submit to me.”

“I don’t think you tried asking yet.”

Risai rubbed Night’s Adam's apple, deciding whether or not to push upon it and choke out Night’s life. “You know…” He brought up his free hand, running it through Night’s long, silky hair. His own amber eyes stared into Night’s yellow-green ones, “You are rather beautiful. I’d rather not kill you.”

“I bet you say that to everyone before you strangulate them.” Night joked.

“No. I enjoy killing my prey quickly.”

“Well you aren’t that bad looking yourself but I’m pretty sure I already said that.”

“It’s weird. I’ve never not wanted to kill someone. Not this intensely anyway.” Risai found it odd that Night began to chuckle. “What?”

“I was thinking it wouldn’t be so bad if someone as handsome as you ended up killing me.”

“Are you still hitting on me?”

“Is it working?”

Risai was silent before answering somewhat reluctantly. “I’m afraid it might be. I’m almost tempted to let you live.”

Night replied, “Almost? What will it take for that to actually happen?”

Another smirk, “What did you have in mind?”

Night glanced over Risai’s body, and gave him a suggestive gaze. “I think you know.”  

Risai laughed, “I really think you should reconsider,” he said, but all the same adjusted Night in his arms so that his hips were aligned with the other’s.  

“Your actions aren’t really matching your words,” Night practically purred out and Risai simply smiled to himself.

Risai eagerly let loose his bottoms and freed his arousal from his penal sheath, and, to the best of his ability while being claimed by the neck, Night performed similar actions. Risai began again, “I can’t turn down an opportunity such as this. It’s just not me.” He found his way inside Night, infiltrating his hole, though Night would have appreciated some preparation to the the matter. He acknowledged that he was a part human and animal and that animals tended to get straight into the intercourse, but his human counterpart enjoyed the idea of lubricant.  Night couldn’t really complain though.

Soon enough he got over the discomfort and fervently tried to match Risai’s pace. Risai enjoyed Night’s enthusiasm. He trailed lusty kisses from Night’s chest to his face, then kissed his lips hard; Risai found the sensation of Night’s forked tongue wrapping around his a strange one but it didn’t kill the heat between them and he rammed his cock further, reveling in the moans from Night- and especially the screams. Night attempted to hold his voice but, from what he learned every time, that would never happen. His claws scratched up his walls; and when he wrapped his arms around the other Demon for more of his mouth and definitely more of his girth, Risai’s back was Night’s scratching post. Night was also sure he had to have a concussion by now from hitting his head up against the wall so much but still, he begged for more.

It wouldn’t take much longer for Night to release and from Risai’s labored breathing and erratic movements, he was close as well. He closed his eyes- almost praying to be released. The feeling was torture and weirdly enough, the heat they were making was affecting his pit sensors so he was literally seeing red.

Then suddenly, Night could not breath, and not for lack of trying. Something had closed over his throat and a few seconds later Night remembered Risai’s had kept a hand near his throat and now he was choking him. “What are-” he couldn’t get out the rest. Night tried to push him away but couldn’t find the strength. His legs were pinned so he couldn't kick the Demon off, and he was rapidly losing air.

Risai was now thrusting inside of Night and depriving him of oxygen. He wanted this Demon dead and sex wouldn’t stop him from doing what he loved. He watched the Demon beneath him struggle greatly, the whites of his eyes slowly turning red from hemorrhaging. A short moment Night’s back arched into Risai’s body and he came just like that. After his climax, it appeared to Risai that Night’s strength had depleted further. He was barely pushing Risai away. Now Night’s paw was almost resting against Risai’s chest and his eyes rolling back but trying to maintain focus. A few more thrusts and Risai had spent his seed inside of Night, barely conscious now.

His eyes had just fully rolled back when Risai reluctantly let go of Night’s neck. Night took a breath but still passed out due to physical exhaustion. Risai pulled his pants back on, wanting to turn and leave. Instead he checked to see if Night was still alive and almost sighed in relief when he was.

“What am I doing?” Risai asked himself, a hand hovering over Night’s throat deciding whether or not to finish the job. He ended up turning and leaving the house, disgusted that he could not kill that Demon. He decided, the next one he would kill for sure.

\--

“And you’re sure you can handle them by yourself?” Final asked. He knew Snow had absolutely no problems handling the children; he’d seen her lull them into sleep with such ease just before Final had decided to take his leave; and yet he was still a bit concerned just passing them on to her. With each day that passed, the desire the return the kids- or maybe even abandon them somewhere- grew stronger. The kids were great. The impending feeling of a furious dragon king lighting them up, however, was not.

“Quit worrying so much, Final! Gee, when did you become such a worrywart?”

“I’ve always been like this!” Final couldn’t help but bite out. “I feel like I’m the only one who cares about our wellbeing! Solstice survived the king’s attack so there is NO DOUBT in my mind that the king is alive and currently planning on killing us all. I can just picture us getting burned alive. Or even electrocuted. God, I hope electrocution is a quicker death.”

“Just chill out okay. It’s been a couple weeks already and nothing’s happened yet. Plus Night’s been thinking of a plan to help us out. Probably.” Snow concluded.

“Alright, you know, I love Night. He’s great and all but you and I both know that he’s shit. That pussy’s been putting us in some serious near death situations with his half-assed plans for a few years now. The one he’s coming up with now is probably as shit quality as the others. I honestly don’t know why we keep letting him do it. He’s probably thinking we could just have a big orgy with Zodiac and everything will be hunky-dory.”

Snow giggled at his usage of hunky-dory. “I don’t think he would do something like that. I think you need to have just a little bit more faith in him.”

Final grumbled bitterly to himself. “Whatever, I’m off. I told Rem I wouldn’t be gone for long so I’m sure she’s wondering where I am.” he rambled on, “And it’s not like Harmony’s around to keep her company, although I can only wonder what they’re doing out this late. Anyway, See ya.” he waved goodbye and made his way home.

\--

Remedy perked up happily after hearing sounds near the front door, but almost immediately her mood dampened when it sounded like things breaking. The door? Without making a sound, Remedy made her way from her room, downstairs, peering around silently. She found the door broken down from its hinges but nothing else was there besides the light from the moon. “Lanif?” the child called out. There was no response and Remedy tiptoed to the open way glancing outside for anyone. “Final?”

It was strange there wasn’t anyone around. Sure it was late but there was always a Demon or Hybrid or two out and about, especially the nocturnal ones. And something else bothered the young Demon. It smelled like blood. A lot of it.

A noise coming from  inside the house startled her. “Final if this is your idea of a joke it isn’t funny!” Remedy tried to see through the darkness. She witnessed a figure in the distance, eyes meeting bright gold ones instead of the jade green of her brother’s. “Who are y-ah!” Remedy was suddenly lifted in the air “Let me go!”

“You aren’t what I’m looking for,” Risai’s voice filled her ears. “...but you’ve been around them. Tell me what you know child.”

“I. Don’t. Know. What. You’re. Talking about!!” Remedy tried to struggle out of his grip but to no avail.

“The children. What do you know about the children?”

“Children?” Remedy thought on it. “But the only-” she quickly stopped herself, remembering her brother telling her not to say anything about those dragon children to anyone.

“What was that?” the Demon prompted.

“N-nothing. I don’t know anything!”

The Demon brought his free hand up to Remedy’s neck. “Child, I despise lies. If you tell me what you know I may spare you.”

“No! I told you already I don’t know anything. You’d better let me go or my big brother’s gonna get angry and kill you!” Remedy spat.

“Rem!” Final’s voice shouted, as if summoned by the pleas of his younger sibling. “Let my sister go!”

“Ah, you must be the big brother.”

“Final! Help me!” Rem cried.

“Let her go you piece of shit! If you’re looking for the king’s kids, they aren’t here.”

“That much I figured,” Risai sniffed the air. “However, you smell strongly of them.” he said to Final. “You have the info I want.”

“If your nose is so good why don’t you just follow the scent to them?” commented Final. He cringed, cursing himself for suggesting that. It would lead right to Snow!

Risai only gave the other Demon a sly smirk. “Yes, I suppose it would be easier that way wouldn’t it. Well,” with ease, Risai twisted the child’s neck and dropped her body, “guess I’d better get going.”

Final froze up. Did he just…? “...R..em…?”

“I assure you, she’s quite dead.” Risai elaborated as he walked up to Final, still blocking the path outside. “You wanna move aside?”

“You...killed her. You just killed my little sister. She was only ten! Why?” Final’s voice was broken.

“I thought you’d have some sort of reaction.” Risai answered drily. “It’s pretty funny. Now if you would kindly mov-” he was cut off by Final grabbing his throat one hand. Risai saw Final’s jade green eyes turn a furious vermillion!

“I’m going to kill you. I’m-”  Final tore off his scarf and half his body morphed, becoming bestial. He screamed, “I’M GOING TO KILL YOU!”

For a moment the red head’s anger was amusing Risai, but after seeing the Demon half transformed, he thought maybe he had underestimated what the man could do. He attempted to push Final back with his wings, but the other Demon refused to let up, crushing Risai’s throat.

With great effort Risai shoved Final away with his legs and took in all the air he could before Final came at him again. I need to get out of here, I can’t handle this guy! Risai made a break for the door but was caught by a wing, effortlessly tossed out of the house. On the plus side, Risai was happy he had gotten out like his wanted; on the downside, Final had thrown him straight through a wall- as if he didn’t have the mindset to throw him out of the doorway that no longer had a door. He probably didn’t.

Risai took a running start before launching himself in the sky, thinking flying away would be the best bet to get away. And taking Final’s advice, his next move was to follow the scent of where Final had come from, hoping it would lead to these damn children already. I’m getting sick of this. “Ah-!” Risai was being weighed down by something. He looked to see Final clinging to his leg and climbing his way up. Did he jump?? “Heh, you’re a persistent little monkey.” Risai tried to shake Final off but his grip did not fail and it was affecting how well Risai could fly.

Final clawed his way to Risai’s back and grabbed his wings, slowly ripping the appendages from his body. Risai cried out, feeling the muscles being ripped from his back, and chose to nose dive, thinking the Demon would let go. He did not, however, realize how close he was to anything in particular and slammed full speed into the roof of a house. Final lost his grip and tumbled aways from Risai.

 

“God damn it…” Risai cursed at himself and pushed himself up from the ground. “Ah-Fuck!” Moving his shoulders moved his wings, and the whole area in particular hurt Risai like hell. That fucking monkey! Risai glared in Final’s direction. The other Demon was gradually making his way off the ground, telling Risai that he also needed to get up. He forced himself to his feet, brushing aside his hair, freed from its hairclips and matted with his own blood. He ran up to Final and backhanded him off the roof; though Final managed to grab Risai by the hair and pull the Demon down with him. Final used Risai to break his fall only to pick Risai back up by the arms and toss him aside, straight into the house they had fallen on top of.

Risai decided to step up his game because he was getting sick of Final tossing him around and almost ripping off his wings. I needed those to fly back to the castle! What am I supposed to do now? Walk? I don’t thi-

Risai was too busy pondering over trivial things to remember that he was still in fact being attacked. A hard punch in the face from Final, causing his head to slam into the building, easily reminded him of his situation and Risai became serious. He stood and waited until he found an opening, elbowing Final in the neck as hard as he possibly could.

Final stumbled to the ground, clutching his throat, desperately inhaling air as if it it were his last. Risai sought out the chance to escape once again, instinctively spreading out his wings for take off but he had forgotten- “Shit!” he muttered. His wings had been partially ripped off and they hurt very, very badly. Risai sucked his teeth and turned back to Final, who was still trying to recover from Risai’s blow.

Risai raised a brow at himself. He was about ready to leave this bothersome Demon to live instead of doing what the self proclaimed queen had ordered, which was to kill the kidnappers and anyone involved. Live! Risai damn near killed anyone when he felt like it, and yet, ever since he’d set out on this quest to find these damned children, he wasn’t even able to do the one thing he enjoyed. He took a step...then a few more until he was inches away from Final’s air deprived body. Risai lifted his foot. If he crushed the man’s neck now, maybe he’d regain some of his pride or whatever he felt he had lost between having sex with Night and having his wings partially rip off by Final. Although Risai did have to admit that sex was a nice plus. But back to business...

Just when he brought his foot down some unknown force pushed him away. Risai staggered back from the Demon, confused as to what had forced him back. There was nothing in front of him so why…? Wait. Risai sniffed the air. Someone was here. They were close too. Also the children. Finally. Momentarily forgetting about the invisible force, Risai headed toward the scent of the children, praying to himself that they actually were present in this house, so he would not have to make another trip- especially with the loss of his wings. But once again, an invisible force had knocked into him, this time making him fall ungracefully to the ground.  Risai had to wonder how he immediately forgotten about how someone else was here and was currently having a blast fucking with him- and not in the way that he would have liked.

“Whoever is there, would you fucking quit it and show yourself.”

“Aw, you’re no fun.”

Risai could only described this as a little lady’s voice and he was right, as a small Demon girl, appearing before him. She was kneeling protectively beside Final. “I’m not letting you take them.” She declared firmly.

“Clearly,” Risai was unimpressed. The camouflage may be a bit of a  problem but otherwise, this tiny Demon would be no problem for him. She would be his redemption.

  
  


“Final, get up.” She ordered. She shook the redhead and maintained eye contact with Risai. Snow was ready to attack him, if he made any sudden movements. Well she was until she heard Final growling angrily, muttering something incoherent. She quickly looked to him and saw his scarf was missing. “Final, where the hell-”

“Kill, kill, kill,” Is what Final had been muttering the entire time.

“Final?”

“It’s no use,” Risai spoke and Snow’s head whipped toward him. “I don’t think he’s listening to you. Or anyone really. He took that scarf off and he went crazy.”

“You, who the hell are you and what did you do to Final?” Snow sniffed the air,  catching a bit of Night’s scent on him. Shit, did Night get screwed over as well?

“I’m Risai, and you obviously already know why I’m here. As for the boy, I did nothing to him, he’s been beating me senseless since I ran into him. His little sister, however, I cannot honestly say that I did nothing to her. He must have loved her very much.” Risai smirked triumphantly.

Remedy, oh god! Snow stood and picked Final up by the arm. He sort of hung limply. “Get up, you idiot!” Final shot a glare at her and she almost drew back in fear. “S-snap out of it! I get it you’re angry but you need to focus!”

“He killed Remedy!” Final’s voice came out rough and somewhat distorted. Snow was shocked he gave a reasonable response. When his scarf came off, he basically lost all his senses. “I WANT TO KILL HIM!”

“I-it’s okay, I know you’re angry, but I need you to calm down. Or at least channel your anger toward him, okay?”

“With pleasure.” Final growled and sped toward Risai. He grabbed Risai’s hair, wanting to toss him to the ground but Risai wasn’t having it again. He grabbed Final’s hand twisting it around completely. Final cried out.

“Stop grabbing my fucking hair.” He was really liking the idea of ripping, his heart out but another unknown force had come and kicked him in the back of the head. This gave Final a chance to knee Risai in the jaw, grab it, and thrust his head into the ground, grinding his face into the dirt. He stomped angrily on his skull.

“Final…” Snow didn’t have much to say. She wanted him to chill out but at the same time, she understood why he was angry.

“Hey, sis,” a new voice sounded. A small Demon, just a few inches smaller than Snow, appeared next to her; he had the same pure white hair as his sister and his grey eyes were heavily outlined with liner.

“Hey, thanks for helping out, Hale.”

“Of course, I can’t let you guys die, but what’s with Final? I don’t think I’ve seen him so angry.”

“Well, he took his scarf off, but is really unhappy. I think this is him coping.” Snow answered. Hale was prompted to ask her to elaborate but was interrupted by laughter coming from Risai.

 

“I’m sick of you all,” he said eerily and from the dent in the ground he was being stomped into, an enormous tiger spawned, its bat wings unfurling and pushing back the Demons who remained on the ground. Immediately Risai’s new form destroyed Snow’s house.

“No, damn it!” Snow yelled. “He’s supposed to be taking the children back alive!”

Hale affirmed, “He’s probably too irritated to think rationally. Kinda like Final,” Hale pointed to the half-transformed Demon, who was grabbing at Risai’s tail and dragging him away from the barely standing structure. Hale was surprised with Final’s strength, as the fully transformed Demon was seemingly sliding back due to Final’s effort, but Risai simply flicked his tail downward and Final crashed hard into the ground. He didn’t make an effort to get back up so Snow assumed he either reached his limit or he was dead. She desperately wished for the former as she approached him.

Risai on the other hand rummaged through the house, as if searching. Then he suddenly shot up in the air, wings beating in the direction of the castle.

“Hale,” Snow began but he was already running toward their former house to scope things out. She on the other hand went to check on Final. Fortunately, he had just been knocked out. His face had also morphed to normal.

The sound of what sounded like crying caught Snow’s attention. No way…

“Hey sis, I think that guy forgot something.”

She whirled around to see Hale holding one of the king’s children in his arms. “Holy-” she ran toward him, checking the child for any injuries, as if she were the mother. “She seems fine, there’s barely a scratch on her. Tough little tyke.”

Hale nodded and tried bouncing the child to quiet her down.“I’ll say. What are we going to do now?”

“I don’t really know,” Snow stared at the ground for the longest time, trying to gather her thoughts. “Okay, okay, We’ll go to Night’s. Plenty of space for us to rest. I guess we’ll also see whether he’s alive or not. Are you alright taking both of them there? Is that too much weight?”

Hale unfurled huge brown wings, those of a barn owl’s, and responded,“I can handle it. What’ll you do?”

“I’ve got to go by Final’s and take care of Remedy.”

 

 


	5. Chapter 5

** Chapter 5 **

 

What in the world happened last night? Risai asked. Actually he was fully aware of what happened, the question was more like why?  Why is it that he got his ass thoroughly whooped? Why did he need to resolve the issue by transforming? Why did he have sex with that one Demon? Well it was pretty nice, but why didn’t he kill him— or anyone for that matter? And most of all...He looked at the wretched little infant in his hands and scowled.

Why had he only brought back _one_ of the children?

 _Ugh, rationality, energy, the cost of transforming is too much._ Risai thought to himself. But on the bright side, the rapid healing from his transformation had repaired his wings so he was able to fly again. The infant in his hands started to sob. “Stop it now. I have no time for your wailing.” He had to think of a way to explain this to the self-proclaimed queen. He wouldn’t- well couldn’t lie to her. Despite his horrific nature, he was a truthful Demon.

He ventured his way inside the castle, carefully concealing the infant with a wing, until he had found Dream.

Her eyes set upon the Demon and eagerly she questioned, “You’re back? My children?” Risai brought back his wing revealing the child in his arms. Dream snatched the babe from him, embracing her child deeply. “Oh! Lian, my darling, I cannot express enough how happy I am to see you!” Her eyes caught Risai again. “What about Astro, where is she?”

So, he wouldn’t lie, but Risai thought, maybe he could appeal to her needs, tell her what she wanted to hear. The first step was to kneel, “Your Majesty—”

She cut him off, “Did you not bring her back? I _did_ specify that there was more than one child. How could you have possibly have butchered this?”

“Please, if you allow me to speak…” Her silence led Risai to continue. “I will admit I was at a disadvantage when facing the kidnappers. In the end I abandoned them and saved one of your children.”

“What? So you didn’t even kill the people who kidnapped my daughters? Why did I even bother sending you?”

“If I may, Your Majesty, I do have the information of where you could find your daughter. You wanted to retrieve your children yourself, correct? I did have a run in with the kidnappers.”

Dream’s eyes seemed to shine with interest. “You know where they are.”

“That I do. And, if you would allow it, I could escort you there.”

Dream answered immediately, “I _will_ allow this. This is much better than anything! While I am furious that you failed to bring back both of daughters, I can personally see to it that those thieves burn!” She turned heel and rushed away with her child in hand.

Taken aback by her actions Risai asked, “W-where are you going?”

“I’m going to prep myself for everything. Rest up while you can. I plan to bring hellfire.”

 

Her words sent chills through Risai’s body and for the first time in a while, he felt fear— a small twinge but it was present. _This is getting even more interesting._

 

 

“You will not touch me with that instrument!” Zodiac was yelling; his wings were outstretched threateningly.

“Your Highness, you’ve torn the stitches in your wings, I have to attend to them.” The Demon nurse was saying but she was backed into a corner for fear of her life.

“No you don’t—”

“My, Zodiac, I had no idea you were afraid of needles,” Dream commented after she had just walked in.

“I am not! My wings are outrageously sore. If that needle—” Zodiac got a good look of Dream— a really good look at her and more specifically what— who she was holding. “Is that _Lian_?” Zodiac hurried to Dream. “My god…! That guard of mine actually brought her back? But wait Astro, where is our first-born?”

“Your guards aren’t very competent, is that so hard to believe?”

“I suppose it is not,” Zodiac answered, carefully withdrawing Lian from Dream’s arms, swaddling her in his arms. The infant seemed to curl into her father’s touch and a smile graced the dragon king’s face. That is until the Demon nurse spoke.

“U-uh, excuse me?” her timid voice spoke. “What’s going on? Your Majesty, you have children?”

Zodiac sent a glare her away. “She knows.” He had no qualms over lighting the poor nurse up.

Dream placed a hand on his shoulder, tenderly, lovingly, “My king it’s fine.”

“Fine?” he questioned and Dream nodded.

“Gather an army. We are to be married. Immediately.”

Zodiac was completely blown away by this information. “Wait, now? Public??”

“I plan to get our daughter back by all means necessary. I want your guards to know who’s charge while I completely destroy the kidnappers and the town harboring them.”

The nurse spoke again, “Wait, this maid has bore your children?” Dream grew tired of her silly questions and decided to snap her neck.

Zodiac blinked. “You have become a lot more homicidal than I remember.”

“Our children have been gone for weeks. Do you understand? You have been unconscious for most of it, but I have not. I remained here, awake. It’s driving me crazy. Surely you share my anger?”

“Of course, my Queen. Please do what you must...Will I be joining you afterwards?”

“No, I will go alone. I want to be greeted by my husband, my king when I return.”

Zodiac bowed slightly, though daughter still in hand. “Yes, My Queen.” He looked her in the eye, “To the altar then?”

“Why do you look so giddy?”

“I have been asking for your hand for years. I am thrilled you have finally accepted.”

Dream rolled her eyes. “This time I asked you.”

Zodiac kissed her, “To the altar, my love!”

 

             

“You’re alright though?” Hale asked Night eyeing the bruised skin under the fur around his neck. It was amazing how he could see the bruise through the darkness of his coat, but what was really freaking him out, and what he was trying to avoid looking at, was the deep red of Night’s sclera.

“I’m—” Night tried to confirm his state of well-being, but his voice was hoarse and broken so he just nodded.

 

Snow barged through the front door, Final’s scarf in hand. “Wrap this Final’s neck, will you?” She ordered her brother.

“It’s morning now. What took you so long?”

“Well first of all you know I’m a slow walker. Also, literally, the street to Final’s was littered with bodies so it took me like hours to compose myself. And Harmony had found Remedy before me so I dealt with her. Eventually we took care of Rem…”

“Wh— happened to R—” Night cleared his throat out of discomfort. Snow’s eyes glanced to Night.

“Shit, are you alright? Your eyes-did he choke you?” Snow queried. Night nodded. “How’d you even get away?” Night shrugged but his eyes cutting away from Snow so suddenly made her slightly suspicious.

“Remedy?” he tried again in a gravelly voice.

“That guy from last night, Risai or whatever killed her. Snapped her neck. It’s so fucked up.”

             

“She was only ten…” All three of the Demon’s turned toward Final in surprise. They all assumed he was resting but he was in fact sitting on Night’s bed staring straight at them with angry red eyes. “I mean, I just don’t understand why it was so necessary to kill her. What could she have possibly done?” Final swiping tears from his eyes as soon as they formed and sat upright in the bed. “Can I have my scarf?”

As Hale handed him the yellow clothing, Night asked as best he could, “Are you alright?”

“Of course not.” Final bit out. He eyed Astro, who was clinging onto Night’s leg, Final guessed, the entire time. “Where’s the other one?” he asked scanning the room for the second dragon baby.

“He took it,” Hale answered. “Somehow he forgot that one.”

“...If he took it back to the king, we need to leave, like right now or we’re gonna be dead.” Final said.

“Why’s that?” Hale’s voice was full of concern.

              “I’m more than certain that when the king or even the mother of the children find out about us, it’s not going to be pretty. They’re probably on our way here now. Which is why I think we should leave right now.”

Snow agreed. “Final’s right. We need to skip town.” Her shoulders seemed to visibly slump, “Oh, but…”

Hale rose a brow at his sister, “What is it sis?”

Snow shook her head. “No, nevermind, it’s nothing.” Of course her brother knew her better than that to just give up so easily. “What about both of your siblings? Shouldn’t we warn them too just in case?”

“The king only wants us and since the Demon from last night knows what we look like, he could point us out easy.” Final explained.

“Yeah, but still…” Snow murmured, chewing at her bottom lip worriedly. “They should at least know.”

“I can tell them.” Hale declared. “With my wings it won’t take that long.”

“Do whatever you want. I insist we leave now.” Final adjured and he stood. “Are you coming or do you plan to wait and die?”

Night managed to say “Fine,” if only to get Final to shut up. Snow looked to Hale who met eyes with her.

“Yeah, I’m coming.” she eventually responded.

The four meandered outside, Night carrying Astro in his arms. Hale stopped to have a word with his sister— a conversation which ended in a loving hug and an “I’ll see you soon,” from Snow; then Hale took off in the opposite direction. She regrouped with Final and Night, ignoring the latter’s curious gaze.

“Let’s hurry up and get out of here already.” She said. And the three easily left their homes and family behind.

 

             

The guards, now gathered in a hurried army, now knew. Knew that Dream meant business. She was the Queen now and they knew better than to question her orders. She glanced over guards who she had encountered in the near past and they looked down in shame of their actions. Dream would have laughed but she was above it. Well at this moment in particular.

She quickly explained the situation- of her daughters and the plan to retrieve them. Dream expected them to object to her, but instead was met with sounds of approval. She wondered if, like Risai, these guards were tired of being cooped up in the castle. It had been quite some time since the king’s last raid.

She ordered them make haste to the location Risai described. The guards with flight would have no problem leading the course and marking the way. Risai mentioned that on foot, it would probably take a day or two, but Dream planned to make it there tonight. There would be no rest, she needed her daughter out of those criminal’s hands. Lest her sanity slip away completely.

Something slipped around her shoulders and Dream quickly realized that Zodiac had placed his cape— his favorite cape— around her shoulders. It was rare to see him without it.

“It is chilly during the nights,” he explained.

Dream nodded. “I will try to return soon to you, my king.”

“And I will wait, impatiently, for you and our daughter’s arrival.” He stole her lips momentarily before sending her off.

 

\--

 

As Dream had planned, they had reached the hidden town within a day. Of course it took a bit of encouragement since her army had been marching since morning. Nonetheless, they were here and the guards’ seemed to excite when she began issuing orders.

“The kidnappers may have been smart enough to have left but check the houses anyway. If there isn’t a Demon child, that of a dragon, you may slaughter as you please.” The troops lit up. It seemed murder was a common interest among the Demons here. Maybe it was just in our blood, Dream wondered. “However, do not lay a finger on my daughter. You will surely pay the price.”

There were collective nods of understanding. Dream stood aside and with the wave of her hand, she let the army have at it.

 

Risai, who insisted that he remain at Dream’s side, spoke to her, “Do you honestly believe those Demons are still here?”

Dream watched as flames quickly spread through the town, lighting up the dark sky. The screams of people began to replace the sound of crickets chirping in the evening. “Absolutely not. However this way if they have family, friends that they’ve left behind, they can...reflect on their actions.”

Risai was elated. “God, if you weren’t the king’s, I’d be all over you right now. But I am a respectable Demon.”

Dream made a sound of absolute disgust. “Hardly,” she retorted scoffingly. She signaled for a few of the flying troops to come to her. “Scout ahead and see if anyone noteworthy is traveling outside of this village. “ She ordered and they scattered. Turning back to Risai she said, “Let us make our way through this hopeless town. Hope you can keep up with me.”

“Yes, Your Majesty.”

 

\--

Hale was doing his best scouting the area from the highest tree-top he could find in their vicinity. He was trying to console everyone by seeing if there was a town or something nearby. They had been walking non-stop with breaks that only lasted a couple minutes, and were mostly for the babe, so the four of them were really hoping that they were near any sort of civilization.

Of course they should have known better than to hope for that. After all, Zodiac basically declared a war on all Hybrids and wiped out hundreds of cities and villages alike. If there were refuge nearby, it’d probably be in ashes.

Hale sighed and jumped from the tree-top, gracefully gliding back down to the Demon trio. They looked to him somewhat expectantly. He shook his head. “As expected there’s nothing but forest. Although I did see a clearing up ahead. But from what I can see, beyond that, it’s back to forest.”

Night sighed irritably.

“I agree.” Snow chimed in.

“I know, we’re all tired but let’s at least get to the clearing. Maybe we’ll take a ten minute break there instead of a two minute one,” Final told them. Night rolled his eyes at him and trudged on. Raw and jaded, the four continued to slog on until they reached the clearing, wide and grassy, a few rocks and trees littered about. There, the four Demons promptly dropped to the ground. Final lie flat on his back in the grass, Night found the nearest tree and curled up into a ball with Astro, desperately trying to get some rest. Hale and Snow found a particularly wide boulder, near Night, and sat upon it.

Snow rubbed her feet, which were aching horribly. “Hale, please carry me the rest of the way.”

He snorted. “Yeah, not happening.”

“Come on,” she whined, “my feet are killing me. I’m not meant to walk long distances— and definitely not non-stop like this!”

“Do you think it’s any easier when you have talons?” countered Hale.

“I think you should just help out your big sister...”

Hale didn’t miss a beat, “I think you should get over it.”

“I think you should both shut up!” Night managed to rasp. Both Hale and Snow looked at him, shocked by the rawness of his voice.

“Is he alright?” Hale asked

Snow shrugged, “He’s probably just grumpy he missed his morning nap,” She couldn’t help but voice her opinion, “maybe we wouldn’t be in this situation if _someone_ hadn’t insisted on kidnapping the king’s children.” Night shot a hard glare at her, eyes blazing red, and Snow almost yelped out loud, as if his glare physically hurt her. “Jeez, sorry” she muttered. She scanned where Final was lying and saw that he too was trying to sleep. “I guess we should probably get a little shut eye too?” Snow suggested.

“Yeah, that’d be nice.” Hale responded. They positioned themselves so that they were supporting one another with their backs. In a few moments they had fallen asleep.  

 

\--

Night was being roused by a persistent nudging to his shoulder. His bleary eyes made out Astro and saw her as the source of the nudging. He tried to ask her what the matter was but his voice continued to refuse to work properly. The child seemed to be anxiously looking toward the forest behind them. His vision finally focused and he shot up. Night looked from Final, passed out in the grass to Hale and Snow, sleeping soundly against each other. How long had they been sleeping? It was almost dawn! Night ears twitched at the sound of rustling leaves and breaking branches from close by. He could sense a line of heat signatures heading toward them! _Shit_.

He snatched up Astro and rushed over to Snow and Hale, shaking them furiously. The two siblings woke with ease giving him concerned looks. “We need to leave,” Night found that he could still whisper. “Now.” They both nodded and tried to go on ahead while Night moved to Final. He tapped and shook, eventually grabbing Final’s arm and lifting him to his feet so he could wake up.

“Huh? Wha— Night? What’s happening?” Final asked groggily.

“We need to go, alright—”

As soon as those words left Night’s mouth he realized it was too late for them. They had been surrounded by the king’s guards. Snow and Hale were grouping back up with Final and Night as the guards slowly enclosed the four Demons.

“Crap how’re we supposed to get out of this?” Snow wondered.

“Hope you aren’t relying on Night.” Final warned, to which Night responded with a ragged hiss.

 

A powerful voice cut through their bit of chatter. “You guards actually did a good job for once.” The circle of guards widened a bit to let in Dream. She stepped in, feeling rather victorious. Risai followed, lingering a bit behind her. Final locked eyes with the Demon- his sister’s murderer. He almost attacked out of rage but it seemed Night knew exactly what he was up to, and held him back. He, however, also seemed a bit uneasy looking at Risai. “Looks like I’ve finally caught you.” The four stayed silent and that was completely fine for Dream. She gave a hard look at Night, holding Astro, who recognized her mother and reached a hand out, signaling she wanted to be in her arms. “My child, if you will.”

Night refused and Final was getting sick of it all. “Just give her the kid Night. Maybe she’ll let us go.” Of course that was just wishful thinking on Final’s behalf. Dream chuckling to herself after the statement didn’t exactly help his case either.

“If you return her to me peacefully, I’ll consider sparing your life.” Dream claimed.

Hale considered maybe distracting the guards by flying or something along the lines, but soon saw that there were flying sentries as well and thought the better of it. “Camo?” he mouthed to his sister. She gave him an approving look. In an instant the two disappeared breaking through the circle. The guards began to crowd in on Final and Night since they were visible, but they easily broke through with little force.

Dream was annoyed with this inconvenience and chased down Night. She would have caught up if it weren’t for the chameleon siblings tripping her up. Dream fell to the ground and skidded, losing the distance she desperately tried to close up between her and her child. Fortunately, Risai shot up ahead of her using his wings.

He managed to stop in front of Night. “Hello, again.” Night sucked his teeth and backed away slowly. “You don’t want to speak to me? Do you hate me, even after our shared night? Well, I suppose I did crush your neck a bit. I got a bit carried away.”

Final came up from his side with a roundhouse kick that Risai swiftly avoided.

“Ah, and you. Why you’ve calmed down quite a bit haven’t you?”

“Shut the fuck up!” Final spat at the Demon.

Dream, now behind the two, spoke. “This is the last time I’m going to try and be polite. Give me my child and I’ll kill you all!” Risai chuckled at her statement.

“Night…” Final said urgently.

“No!” The other responded, whispering, “What’s the point if she’s just going to kill us anyway?”

Final argued back, “What’s the point of keeping her if we’re just going to be dead?” Night didn’t respond and became even more frustrated with the situation.

Meanwhile Dream’s ear’s picked up on two others lingering about. She raised a leg and stomped down hard in front of her, whilst grabbing the air to her left. It was soon revealed that Snow had been trapped under the queen, her foot crushing her ribs, and Hale had been grabbed by the throat. “How, pathetic. Let me strike you a deal then, since you are so adamant about keeping my daughter.” She pushed more weight onto Snow and tightened her grip on Hale. “How about you let her go and I let you all live. No repercussions at all.”

“She’s bluffing.” Final pointed out. “Night none of this shit matters anymore. If we ditch the kid, we’ll have a better chance of survival.”

“Will you shut up already!?”

Final blew up, “I’m only telling you the truth. We don’t need that kid— we never did! Your stupid little plan didn’t work out in our favor! Instead it made everything a shit ton worse! There is absolutely no point in keeping her anymore, don’t you get it!”

 _God dammit!_ Night thought to himself. There was just too much shit happening. Snow and Hale were going to be killed no matter what he did. And deep down, Night knew Final was right. He had been right since the beginning. As usual Night’s plan was pathetic and needed work. But it was too fucking late to think that now because they were all fucked if he didn’t think of something soon. And nothing half-assed not this time.

For some reason he looked to Risai, as if he would have the answer and Risai himself was a bit curious about it. Then Night smiled to himself. It didn’t settle well with Risai meaning something interesting was about to happen.

“Tick, tock.” Dream had spoken once again.

“Fine, you can have her.” Night said calmly and held Astro out as if she were simply an object to be won.

Final was genuinely surprised by this decision. Dream’s eyes lit up and immediately she released Hale and Snow. She made out to rightfully claim her daughter but of course nothing was so easy.

Night grabbed the child’s neck last minute and twisted it, the wretched cracking of her neck reverberated, as if it was amplified by some device.

It was like Final said. They didn’t need her anymore.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

An unearthly screech pierced through the air.

Night dropped the child to the ground and starting issuing orders as best he could with his shot voice. “Get up you two, hurry up we need to leave, now!”  He was pushing Final toward the other side of the clearing, completely prepared to strike down Risai from their path, but the Demon made no attempts to stop them and instead stepped out of the way so they could get by.

The other guards let up their chase as they could not catch up, and Hale took care of the flying ones.  Dream didn’t make an attempt to hunt them down, so the four were basically home free.

 

Risai watched the four Demon’s leave and smirked to himself. His blood was pumping so fast, he thought it would explode. “Holy shit! I didn’t think he had it in him…!”  His eyes glided to Dream. She was kneeling before the corpse of her child just staring blankly. Risai tsked. “Is that all?” He walked over to her and all her vulnerability. “Are you finished? Is it that easy to break you?”

Dream looked up slowly. “Easy…?” she stood up and clawed Risai’s face. “My child is dead!” His head jerked back but once he re-established eye contact, he was glowering at Dream dangerously. “Get out of my sight,”  She choked on her last few words and covered her face, walking back to Astro’s corpse. She signaled for one of the other flying guards to come to her.

The guard bowed respectfully, “Yes, Your Highness,” she said tentatively, unsure of the queen’s temper and hoping it wasn’t as bad as the king’s.

Dream put on her most steady voice. “I’m sorry to make you do this, but I must request that you inform the king about...this incident and bring him to me. You must also tell him that...our child has passed. If he tries to harm you please tell him harming the messenger will not bring Astro back. That is all. And please be quick. I will remain here. ”

“Yes, ma’am!” the guard responded and shot into the air, flying at her top speed toward the castle.

The other guards approached her. “My Liege, shall we go after those Demons?”

“Do whatever you want…”

They glanced at each other awkwardly but decided on hunting down the kidnappers rather than doing nothing. Afterall, they did come all this way.

Dream payed them no mind, only realizing that they had left once their footsteps could no longer be heard. Only a few of the sentinels remained, but Dream knew well enough that they were basically useless. The only one with skill was Risai and—  Dream scanned the area— he seemed to have gone away to god-knows-where. Good riddance. She wasn’t overly fond of him anyway.

Her eyes shifted back to Astro’s body. Already her precious daughter was losing her color and, when Dream brushed the child’s hair behind her ear, she was cold to the touch. In a meaningless attempt to warm her, she took her daughter’s body and covered her with the cape Zodiac had given her. She stayed this way for several minutes, bleeding into hours. No one decided to bother her, figuring it was her way of mourning.

 

“My Queen?”

Dream’s head rose and she turned to see that Zodiac had arrived and was giving her an extremely worried look, a facial expression reserved for only her. “My King…”

“Please tell me what that woman told me was false.”

Dream had never seen such a forlorn mien on Zodiac’s face. She revealed their child from underneath the cape and Zodiac was horrified. He looked away a moment, then back to Astro and took her from Dream’s arms, cradling her.

“I’m sor— ”

Zodiac cut her off “There is nothing to apologize for my love.”

“But Astro— ”

“This is not your fault. You must not blame yourself, I will not allow it.”

“But,” Dream couldn’t stop the tears from coming now, “How do I not blame myself for this. I came this far and in the end— ” Dream threw herself into Zodiac, bawling heavily. He, of course, shed his tears along with her, whilst trying to soothe his queen by caressing her head gently.

 

“What do we do with her?” Dream asked after a while. “I mean do we...bury her?”

“Here?” questioned Zodiac

“I don’t want to send her back to the castle. I feel it would be a bit odd.”

The king nodded. “Very well then.”

They picked out a spot they found worthy, placed Astro’s body inside, said their goodbyes, and buried her. Dream spoke silently, “I’m sorry my child.”

 

“Your Highness!” Both royalties turned toward the voice that called out to them. Well one of them. Another flying sentry was coming their way and landed. Once the guard realized the king was also present he bowed immediately and corrected himself. “Uh, Your...Highnesses.”

“What is it?” Dream prompted.

“Ma’am, it is about the kidnappers, they have e-escaped. However, from their position, they aren’t too far from a charred village, ma’am.”

Dream looked to Zodiac who was readying his wings, still not completely recovered from his previous fight. “Take me with you.”

“I would have it no other way.”

 

—

(THEY FUCK A LIL BIT HERE TOO!!)

Another evening had settled in and the four Demons had finally decided to take another break, since clearly no one else was chasing them anymore. And of course that’s when all hell broke loose.

Snow began, “I can’t believe it…”

“That we got away?” Hale tried.

“No, well yes, but I can’t believe Night. He killed the king’s child. What the hell?” she continued on realizing Night wasn’t going to respond. “So you have absolutely nothing to say?”Snow turned to Final. “What about you? You’ve been quiet for a while now.”

Final sighed. “I think it’s alright.” Everyone whipped their heads toward him in surprise. “Y’know, I’ve been thinking about it and I thought an eye for an eye. They killed my sister so I don’t really care that Night killed their daughter.” Final looked at Night. “We got away in one piece. Good job.”

Night dashed away from the group, thankful no one decided to follow him. He didn’t want to hear that. He didn’t want to hear anything that encouraged what he had just done! He had just murdered a child—A CHILD—  in cold blood!

In the middle of his running, his stomach lurched and bile quickly exited his mouth, leaving him in a fit of coughing. He spit the bad taste out of his mouth and retreated to the nearest tree, still breathing heavy.  What did I do? What did I do? It was chanting over and over in his mind. Why did he do it? Why? Self-preservation, he tried to reason. Everyone was going to die. It was us or her. “Oh, fuck! Fuck! That doesn’t make it any better!”

Night rose his head, looking up to the treetops. Someone was here. King’s guards? The queen? The king? No, no. Once they got close enough, Night was able to recognize the heat signature and settled down a bit but he was still uneasy.

“Oh, you already know I’m here?” Risai dropped down in front of him with a smirk. “You don’t look so good.”

“What are you doing here?” the other hissed.

“I came here for you.” Risai witnessed Night’s scowl and laughed. “You don’t believe me? I’m above doing something as petty as lying.” he pushed Night against the tree. “I want you. Right now.”

Skeptical, Night narrowed his eyes, remembering exactly what happened the last time he willingly gave his body up to this man. “Perhaps not.” he whispered to him.

“Still sour about me choking you? Geez, what were you expecting. I was sent to kill you.”

“I figured since we were engaged in intercourse, you weren't going to kill me. Which was the main reason we were even having sex at all.”

Risai gasped, “You used me? So you could live??” then he was chuckling, “I think I might actually be in love.”

Night groaned, immensely annoyed. “Can you get off of me?”

“Only if you get me off.”

NIght looked at this Demon, disgusted he made the pun. And yet… “Whatever.”

“Ah, is that a yes?” Risai confirmed. Night attacked Risai’s lips with his and the Demon got his answer. He kissed back with such fury and stripped Night’s clothes with the same amount of valor. In no time Risai had infiltrated Night with no warnings. Night didn’t care. He didn’t care about anything at the moment, but this pleasure and anything that could take his mind off all the shit that’s happening. Of course, as fate would have it, anytime he was enjoying himself it would have to be ruined.

Risai was just going to stroke Night’s hair but he figured his hand lingering toward the other’s neck startled him, for Night jerked his head away so suddenly. “I wasn’t going to— ”

“No, no, no, shhhh.” Night ordered. He saw that Night was listening for something. “Get off! Get off me!” Night pushed him away and hurriedly gathered his clothes. Risai calmly corrected himself  seeing as he had more clothes on than Night did.

“Oh, don’t let me interrupt, I’ve already seen enough.” Risai recognized this bratty voice as the redhead of the group.

“Final…”

“You know, earlier before we skipped town, I thought I smelled him on you, but I figured since he choked you out that was why. Now that I’ve heard all that shit, it all makes sense.” Final laughed to himself.

“Final— ” Night wanted to say something but Final wouldn’t let him.

“No, I don’t want to hear whatever bullshit you’re going to say. I just kinda thought you couldn’t sink any lower, but here you are. Anyway, I’ll just be leaving now.”

“Leaving?” Night questioned.

“...I’ve been thinking a shit ton since we left,” Final began, “and leaving crossed my mind multiple times. You’ve been about as effective to us as a chair with no legs and I’ve had it. And let’s not forget about this little affair you’re having with our enemy—  the same guy who killed my little sister.”

Risai shrugged. “If it’s any consolation, I decided I wanted to help you guys out.” Night looked at him in confusion. It was the first he’d heard of this. He was completely under the impression that Risai had come for the sole purpose of getting some.

“Oh, well maybe you’ll have a better chance convincing  Snow and Hale. It seems like you haven’t personally wronged either of them yet. And you’ve already fucked him into submission.” Final huffed in abhorrence. “I’m getting the fuck out of here.”

Panicked, Night blurted, “Wait, where are you going to go?”

“Anywhere away from you will be just fine.”

 

Night couldn’t think of anything else to say and ended up watching Final walk away, disappearing into the forest.

“Is this alright?” Risai couldn’t help but wonder but Night ignored him and changed the subject.

“You’re helping us?”

“Hm? Did I forget to mention it?”  Risai pondered and scratched his head. “Well yeah, I also came to do that. But more importantly I was really lusting after you after that stunt you pulled.”

“I really don’t want to think about it.” Night bit out.

“Yeah, I didn’t pin you as the type to kill children.”

The problem was neither did Night, but apparently his life was more important than anything else. It was only a matter of time before he put himself before or Hale or Snow. He shivered at the thought. “I think break time is over.” He cleared his throat. Even though he was whispering, it wasn’t really helping his throat heal up any faster than it was.

Risai pouted “What? We aren’t going to finish?”

As much as Night wanted to… “I think we should distance ourselves from the queen and whatever else that might be coming while we still can.” Risai was a bit pissed but he figured his libido could wait, as Night was correct.

 

“Care to explain what’s going on here?” Another intruder, Snow, interrogated; though at least, Night thought, he wasn’t indecent. Hale was right behind her sharing the same confused look as his sister

“Snow, um, he’s here to help?” Night figured nothing he would say would convince them right away.

“What? What are you talking about? And where’s Final I know I saw him come this way. I wanted to let you guys know that we should probably get moving. Hale saw the remains of a town up ahead.”

“Great. He’s coming along, apparently,” Night jabbed a thumb in Risai’s direction. “Also Final’s gone.”

“W-wha- What do you mean ‘Final’s gone’? Gone where?” Snow blurted.

“He’s gone as in he left. Left our little group here.”

“I am here to fill the vacancy.” Risai informed

Snow put a hand to Risai’s face, “I’ll get to you in a moment. Back to Final— why would he just leave like that?”

Night involuntarily glanced at Risai trying to think of something to say.

“What are you looking at me for?” Risai whisper-yelled. Highly ineffective since Snow and Hale were in range of hearing most things he said. “You don’t want me to say anything. It won’t work out in your favor.”

“Literally say anything?” Night figured he couldn’t say anything damaging.

“Okay. Your red-head, Final...friend, seemed to be reaching his wits end with…” Risai looked to Night, quickly realizing that he couldn’t recall learning his name. “your leader, and didn’t enjoy the sight of us… copulating, since I am his younger sister’s murderer. And so with that, he left.”

Night figured wrong.

“You were having sex?” Snow exclaimed. “Now?? And with this guy???”

Night glared at Risai, saying “You really could have left that part out.”

“I warned you. I already explained I don’t lie.”

Snow continued on: “What the fuck Night! We’re on the run, you kill a child, and you think it’s just okay to fuck the enemy? I mean what kind of shit is going on through your head lately?”

“Oh, your name is Night?” Risai couldn’t help but comment. “How pretty.”

Snow sighed angrily at the foolishness. “I can see how Final would choose to leave. Hell, I’m damn near tempted to do the same.” Night’s eyes widened. He didn’t like that. Final and Snow were, admittedly, his only friends, and one of them leaving was enough. Snow turned her gaze to Risai. “So what’s your story?’

“I actually came to assist.” he explained.

The tiny Demon frowned. “Assist us how?”

Her tinier brother also asked. “And why? Weren’t you just helping out the queen? What happened in such a short time span that made you want to help us?”

“Night, mostly. I was never truly affiliated with the king as I was simply attracted to the killing. As you’ve probably noticed, I love it and the Hybrid raids were wonderful. Of course those stopped so suddenly and I became so bored. The queen comes along with a plan to retrieve her children and that sounded interesting. A mother will do anything for their child after all, even burn down an entire village.”

“Y-you burned down that hidden town?” Snow asked frantically.

Risai nodded. “I personally did not touch the town, but the guards did. Queen’s orders. However, her reign seemed to end once Night here snapped that child’s neck like a twig.” his gaze drifted to Night, who was now staring at the ground uneasily. “She is broken so I decided to help you guys. It’s more interesting this way.”

 

There was silence after Risai finished. Both Snow and Night seemed distracted, and Hale felt a bit lost. Eventually Night cleared his throat, now aching horribly and said. “I think we should head to wherever Hale saw that town. I’m gonna stop talking now. My throat hurts.”

 

—

(MORE FUCKIN AHEAD I MEAN I’M SO SORRY PROBABLY)

The four Demons reached the remains of a former village. There was hardly any suitable structures arounds that weren’t in shambles or roasted black. Even the grass and ground surrounding the village was as black as coal. The grotesque sight of bones of Hybrids sent chills up Night’s spine and he quickly looked away.

“Hey,” Snow began to him, touching his arm to get his attention. “Are you sure we can trust that guy?” she nodded her head in Risai’s direction. “I mean, he was sent to kill us. A-and he did kill Remedy.”

Night murmured back quietly. “I’m not exactly fond of him myself, but he seems trustworthy. He insists that he is ‘above lying’.”

“You buy that? Huh...” Snow looked briefly at Risai then back to Night. “And are you deciding to trust him because he’s actually trustworthy or do you have a...personal attachment.”

“What? No. I just think maybe he’ll be useful. If he turns on us, well I guess that’s my fault...again.”

“Night what’s your relationship with this guy?”

“There is no relationship, Snow. If you wanna know everything, I slept with him the night we first encountered him so that I could live, but almost died in the process,” he rubbed his bruised neck. “Then, you know, I was with him earlier and…” Night trailed off. “I haven’t been making smart decision but whatever, that’s nothing new.”

Snow took a moment to process and giggled. “Hahahaha! Final was right.” Night gave her a curious look. “Oh, nothing.” she responded still laughing. “You aren’t planning on seducing the king are you?”

“No...?”

“It wouldn’t work you know, I think he’s committed to the queen.”

“Okay?” Night had never been more confused.

Snow simply smiled. “I think I’m just gonna go chat up your boyfriend. See ya!” She ran up to Risai in front of them, Night warned her to be careful.  “Risai, right?”

Risai was somewhat uncomfortable with her present. “What is it, child?”

“Hey, I’m not a child! It’s Snow!”

“Alright then, Snow, what do you want with me?”

“What’s your deal with Night? One night stand not enough?”

The taller of the two laughed. “No, I believe I am truly infatuated with him, for whatever reason. That or I am lusting after him fairly bad. I’m not sure.”

Snow would rather not think about the latter. “Anyway, I have a more serious question. About your wings. The other night, I swear Final had injured them some way or another when he was beating the shit out of you, but you were still able to fly way. How exactly?”

“Ah, well I was healed once I released my Demon form.”

Snow furrowed her brow “What?” but Hale had to ask his part before the other male could respond.

“Also why’d you only take one of the children?”

“You are sacrificing a ton of energy once you transform, and not only that but your reason as well— you can’t think properly. When I took that child I was desperate. That is usually why I choose not to rely on my Demon transformation. Have you never transformed before?” Risai inquired.

Snow and Hale shook their heads, Snow saying: “I don’t think any of us ever have. Except Final, but his transformation is weird.”

“Yes, I remember thinking it was strange how only one half of him looked bestial. It might be a defect from birth or he may not have experienced enough anger to fully transform.” Risai continued. “Although I feel like I wouldn’t be the latter considering I killed his precious little sister.” He thought on it. “Sometimes it’s also possible to transform if your life is endangered enough. Well, he was kicking my ass though. By the way, what’s with the scarf? Once he took it off he transformed. I’ve never seen that before.”

“Right,” Snow said. “Well, according to Final, he’s always had a temper on him so he was always looking at people with creepy red eyes. Eventually Remedy made him that scarf which was supposed to help calm him. It works but I can only assume when he takes it off he’s already super pissed so…” Snow trailed off, not sure if this was actually making any sense.

“Interesting...This could be it though. This could be how I can help, by informing all of you how to unleash your full power...however, I wouldn’t recommend it.”

“I feel like we would have eventually learned that without your help.” Snow said bluntly. Risai rolled his eyes at the comment.

“Well, whatever I may be able to hold my own against the king himself, single-handedly.” he bragged.

“Shut up.” Night told him. They walked a bit further through the village before Night spoke again, “I think this is a good stopping point.”

Snow gave him a questioning look. “We’re stopping?”

Night faced her seriously. “To be honest...I’m just tired of running. We need to face this—whatever this is. So right now you two can both leave like Final, or you can stay. A-and die I guess. They’ll be fine with me though. I killed the kid afterall...”

“Well I’m not leaving.” Snow responded stubbornly.

“Snow—”

“No, you’re right. Running is getting us nowhere. It’s only prolonging what’s eventually coming. Also I’m not gonna let you fight alone, Night.”

“Well, I would have stayed with him.” Risai inputted.

“Okay, but for all we know, you’re just after Night’s ass and not into saving it.”

Risai would have made a comeback but she had a point. Instead he looked to Hale, “And you?”

Hale was surprised to be included in this conversation. “I, uh, was going to stick with my sister. She’s only half as effective without me.”

“Which is still pretty good if you ask me.” Snow boasted.

“No one did.” Hale replied.

“More importantly, I think we should all get some rest before shit hits the fan.” Night said before a fight emerged between the siblings. “I’m going to take a nap so I can be well rested before I die.” He cast a quick glance toward Risai before saying “I’ll be in this abandoned building over here. Come get me when death is upon us.” Night left. Risai’s eyes followed.

“I’ll keep looking out then.” Hale volunteered.

Snow added. “I’ll look out too. We can take shifts.”

 

While they were hashing out their plan, Risai trailed after Night. He found him inside the charred building. Burned down furniture and rubble from the rooftop littered the floor. It was a wonder that the place was still standing. “That was an invitation wasn’t it? A rather uncomfortable place to finish what we started earlier.”

Night basically threw himself at Risai, straddling his body, kissing his mouth furiously. Risai enjoyed his fervor and pushed Night’s back onto the nearest wall, kissing him back, their tongues entangling. Night’s hands traveled down to Risai’s pants and dipped his fingers inside, rubbing his sheath cock until Risai freed it. He did the same, quick to take off Night’s pants and stroking his length. Night arched into him moaning softly. He quickly realized that Risai was ready to take him.

“T-take your time.” he rushed out.

Risai rose an eyebrow. “Scared?”

“Of course not!” he snapped. “I’m probably going to die in a few hours, give or take. Can you just not rush my last moments of pleasure? Please?”

The other Demon was intrigued by the strong emotion coming from Night. He huffed a laugh and smirked. “Of course.” He claimed Night by the lips but it was gentle. Far more gentle than Night ever thought Risai could be, however he indulged himself; kissing back slowly and grabbing Risai’s face as if to take in more of him. Risai was everywhere, from sucking on Night’s tongue to leaving marks the slim parts of skin under his neck. It was all fairly sensual and Night thought was nice considering everything that’s happened. His mouth worked above and his hands below, rubbing Night’s length slowly, and Night was reduced to small moans and squeals. The pleasure was momentarily interrupted by a strange infiltration, Night shortly recognized as Risai’s fingers.

“I realize now that during our previous interactions, you were a bit tense.” Risai commented.

“Y-yes,” It was weird how much more uncomfortable Risai stretching him with his fingers was than his actual penis inside of him. “Hurry up.”

“I thought you didn’t want to rush.”

“It feels weird.”

“Then allow me to distract you.” Risai said kissing Night once again, getting his tongue wrapped by Night’s strange, long, forked one. His mouth traveled further downward, trailing short kisses to Night’s own prick, flicking out his tongue playfully and reveling in Night’s whine. His head rolled.

“Just get it over with,” he groaned.

Risai smiled. “So impatient.” Risai removed his fingers, readying to enter NIght, however the other Demon pushed him into the ground and Risai sat up, shaking off rubble that had dug into his back. Risai smile grew as Night crawled onto him and guided Risai’s cock inside him. “You intend to ride me?”

“Yes,” Night responded, hips already in motion and hand lazily stroking his own staff. He breathed, “Fuck, yes…!” Risai, amused, met pace with the Demon, rising up to attack Night’s mouth, finding absolute delight in the loud moans he was making and the curses he let out. The kissing became far more aggressive as he sped up his movement. The playful nipping they were doing became hard bites, drawing blood, and, Night found, that was really getting Risai off from his groans and increased breathing. Figures he’d get off on pain, the masochist—

“Ah!” God he was hitting his prostate now and holy hell did that feel great! Night was a moaning mess on top of Risai, head tossing and rolling, claws, tearing skin from Risai’s back, which he clearly enjoy based on his delighted cries. Night however couldn’t last much longer, releasing his seed with one last shriek of ecstasy. Risai wasn’t quite finished, thrusting into Night to the point where the overstimulation was beginning to hurt. Thankfully it wasn’t long until he too had come to a climax, stiffening in Night as he spilled his seed inside of him.

 

They sat in silence for a while before Risai finally decided it would be best if he had pulled out of Night. The feeling absolutely disgusted Night. “Did you have to finish inside?”

Risai gave him a meek smile. “Sorry.”

“Argh, I really want a bath.” complained Night.

“Surely there is some water nearby?”Risai suggested.

“I hope so. Let’s hurry and find it before everything happens.”

“You lead the way.”

 

\--

 

Zodiac had finally reached the destroyed village his guard had mentioned and he landed fairly rushed for Dream’s sake. Apparently heights weren’t her forte and she had completely forgotten about it with all that had happened. If it had been a completely different scenario altogether, Zodiac would have laughed at her absentmindedness. However, it appeared he wouldn’t be laughing out of joy for quite a while.

“This is it then?” Dream asked once Zodiac had placed her down, ever-so-gently.

“It would appear so.” he responded.

Dream took in the entire state of this town, completely devastated. There were no signs of living at all and the roads were littered with the skeletons of the less fortunate. “You did all of this?”

Zodiac nodded slowly. “I suppose I did.” He too looked at the bones of the Hybrids and shook his head. “I was such a fool. How could someone as beautiful and angelic as you fall for something as pathetic and terrible as me?” Dream gave him a curious look and Zodiac continued. “Dream, you know of the cruel end of my parents, correct? How they were slaughtered by rouge Hybrids right in front of me when I was just a child. My hatred for Hybrids festered inside of me, for years, until I finally decided to wage ‘war’ on every Hybrid. It was far from a war— it was genocide!”

Dream wondered why her husband had decided to confess so suddenly. “Zodiac?”

The king laughed to himself. “It was far too late to correct my actions once I realized what I had become. I stopped the raids but I could not contain the guilt of having the blood of the innocent on my hands.” Zodiac was shaking horribly and the visual of the mass of deceased Hybrids ahead of him didn’t help his anguished soul. “I cannot help but believe that Astro’s death is the fate I deserve after all I have done.”

“Hey, hey,” Dream put a comforting hand on the arm of her king. “It isn’t just you who is suffering. She was our daughter, alright? We are facing this together. Do you hear me?” She yanked his face down so that Zodiac was making direct eye contact with her and stared the king down, waiting until he finally nodded to let go. “I haven’t been as angelic as you constantly think I am. I burned down an entire settlement for her. There were probably children living there as well but I selfishly thought of my own child and ordered the guards to slaughter anyone they could.” then Dream said. “If you believe that it is wrongdoings that led to our daughter’s tragic end then it is our combined faults that led to her demise. Not just you, my king.” She gave him a small smile. “And hey, we still have Lian. Maybe after all this is over, we can start over again.”

Zodiac did not think it was possible to love Dream anymore than he already did but he was quickly proven wrong. “Well, shall we put an end to everything?”

—

“To be honest, Final leaving was probably a bad idea.” Snow had said suddenly. The four Demon’s had gathered together by Hale’s request. He had seen someone land from afar and they were headed in their direction. Night assumed it was the king and that they should ready themselves for him.

“What are you talking about?” Hale asked.

“Final was the strongest out of all of us, y’know? That would have been useful.”

“Yeah, well if you wanna go and find him, be my guest.” Night told her.

Snow decided not. “So what are we doing? Are we just going to stand here until something happens?”

Night shrugged. “Why not?”

“Hm, maybe that’s not really smart?” Snow suggested.

“Okay, I got it.” Night eyed the entrance of the village. “I can see them and they’re close.  There’s two, and I’m assuming it’s the king and queen. Snow and Hale, lay low and wait until we create an opening to strike. Risai and I will...do our best.”

Risai laughed at his lack of confidence. “I will be doing more than my best. And you will too if you want to live.”

“If all else fails Night, you could try seducing them. That seems to work for you.” Snow said, giggling hysterically.

“Haha, laugh it up while you still can.” He looked toward the entrance again. “Okay disperse or whatever.”

 

With that order, Snow and Hale turned on their camouflage while Risai and Night stayed low to the ground hiding behind rubble. They watched as the king and queen slowly made their way up the rubble-filled pathway.

“Anymore to this plan of yours?” Risai queried.

Night almost laughed. “I making it up as I go along.” Still, Risai seemed to be amused by every word that exited his mouth.

“That works for you?”

“Not really,” Night admitted. He was eyeing the king, sizing him up. Well his horns seem to have grown back fairly well. His wings, however, don’t look like they’re in the best shape. Storm did mention injuring them some way or another. Huh, I wonder if she’s alive. Solstice too… His head whipped to Risai “I don’t know what I’m doing.” he confessed hastily.

“Clearly. Don’t worry, I’ve got this under control.” Risai calmly stood and sauntered out of hiding, where he was immediately spotted by the king and queen. Night wanted so badly to yell at him and pull him back but he restrained himself, figuring he would wait it out until Risai had created a diversion of any sort. Though he wondered how well this would turn out.

“Ah, Your Highnesses. I’ve been waiting.” Risai began.

Dream was first to question his presence, “You disappeared so suddenly I thought you had gone back to the castle. What are you doing here?”

Risai cursed himself. Even to her, he couldn’t force himself to lie. Why did he have to be so truthful? He worked his way around it. “Like I said, I’ve been waiting. I figured you’d come after those Demons eventually. I know where they are.”

Night swore under his breathe. The bastard wasn’t going to sell them out was he?

Zodiac narrowed his eyes. “ You have been tracking them?”

“I have kept tabs on them since I left Her Majesty’s side. Mostly the one who murdered your child. Hardly a threat to either of you.”

“His threat to us doesn’t matter, I want his head!” Dream exclaimed. “And to torture the others that helped him.”

“Ah, yes, they are short one. I didn’t however, make an effort to follow him. The group seems to have had a bit of an argument.”

“Eventually I’ll find the time to murder whoever that is, however that doesn’t matter now. Where are these Demons located?” Dream was running out of patience. Risai was running out of truths.

“Here in these ruins.” he stated. A hidden hand sign to Night signaled help. He could stall no further.

Dream’s temper was rising and she quickly caught Risai by the collar. “We’ve already figured that out! Where exactly you—!” She was interrupted by the forces known as Hale and Snow pushing her forward to the ground. Then, still camouflaged, they attempted to mess around with the king, but one breath of fire kept them back.

Night decided to attack from behind, pouncing at the king but brutality shut down when Zodiac simply tossed his tail to the side. He paid Night no mind, only his queen.

She was taken aback completely when Risai had grabbed her hand and drew it back hard, twisting it in his own, and taking her captive with his other hand hovering dangerously around her neck. “W-what are you doing?”

“I’m sorry, I’ve taken a side and it isn’t yours.” he explained.

“Let her go!” Zodiac demanded. The lightning he formed was visible in his mouth.

“Ah, ah! You shoot me and it’ll go through her as well.” Unfortunately, the king wasn’t so daft and shot his lightning at Risai’s feet, scaring him to the point where his hold on Dream was useless. She escaped easily with a well placed elbow to the ribcage. He recovered but quickly dashed behind the nearest building, seeing as at some point, the rest of his comrades had done the same.

 

“Why are you with them Risai?” demanded Dream. They had already seen where he had retreated so Risai figured why not answer.

“They’ve become the more interesting crowd. Don’t you think?” Footsteps rapidly approached him until he was face to face with Dream and Zodiac once again. Risai smirked devilishly to himself. “I mean who else would dare to murder the child of the king and queen in front of the queen in order to escape. I t—” Risai’s head head snapped back from a blow to the face, and from the king no less. Clearly the king had caught him off guard—which was quite easy when it came to Risai, but instead of a face full of flames or a body packed full of lightning, the king had sucker punched him.

He smiled wildly. This was the exact kind of raw, stupid anger he needed from the two! He couldn’t help but laugh at the sight of Zodiac’s hateful stare. Night took this time to get back up and surprise the king with another attack, this time catching him completely off guard. Risai immediately grabbed Dream and took to the sky, heading back toward the woods.

“Dream!” the king cried. He easily caught the punch  Night threw at him and hurled him away. Desperately he outstretched his wings to go after Risai, but he didn’t make it ten feet into the air before he was knocked back down by Hale, who revealed himself last minute.

Zodiac recovered quickly before he could touch the ground. “You all are exceptionally irritating!” A ball of fire shot toward Hale. He yelped, just barely avoiding being charred to a crisp, but he wasn’t fast enough to catch the king darting past him. Not knowing what he should do, Hale decided to bother Night.

“Are you okay?” Hale asked. Snow appeared beside her sibling, shortly after, wondering the same thing.

Night stood up with a sigh. “I’m still alive. Let’s catch up to Risai before something else happens.”

 

\--

 

Risai was absolutely fine. He had the queen in his arms and was rather enjoying the obscenities she was throwing at him. She struggled greatly, not enjoying being in the air at all.

“Put me down you bastard!”

“I don’t think you want that,” Risai warned, “Do you know how high up we are?” Dream dared to look down and quickly glanced away. “I see you aren’t a fan of heights.”

“God damn it!” Dream grabbed a fist full of Risai’s hair, yanking it so he was looking her in the eye. “Put. Me. Down.”

She regretted it. She knew enough about Risai to figure out he was constantly toying with his victims no matter what, but his entire demeanor had changed in a split second and he was staring at her with hostile, gold eyes. His voice was calm. “Do not pull my hair.” And then he let go of her, the queen’s scream from afar, music to his ears.

For a moment, Risai did feel better. The queen was probably going to die from the fall. No more hair pulling. In the corner of his eye he saw Zodiac, but he was much too far away to do anything.

Or so he thought.

Zodiac must have registered that Risai had dropped his precious queen because one minute Zodiac was yards away, and the next, he was not 2 inches away, but Risai was convulsing too violently to act upon it and immediately fell toward the forest as the queen did.

 

He hit his head. A few times actually. His skull was probably fractured. Or completely destroyed. Risai thought it felt more like it was the latter. When he moved his head the little bit he could, there was a pool of blood surrounding his head mostly. He wondered how long it would take for him to bleed out. Oh...it seemed his vision was already going black. Was he dying or passing out? God if he was like this that so called queen better be dead.

 

—

 

Dream was more fortunate. She did land on her back on a few really thick branches, and then she knocked her head on the ground, but otherwise it was nothing.

She hacked some blood up and spit. Still nothing…

Okay, so she was completely expecting her overprotective king to have caught her at some point during the falling period, but hey, she was still alive. Maybe bleeding internally but it’s fine. She managed to stand, a bit unsteady, and looked up. Ah, there he is. Dream thought as Zodiac landed in front of her almost as soon as she regained her balance.

“Are you alright!” There was avid fear in his tone. “My queen?!”

“I’m standing.”

Almost screeching every word, Zodiac said, “I am sorry! As quick as I may be, I was still unable to prevent harm to you! I am so glad you appear to be alright!”

“Honestly, the falling part felt worse than actually hitting the ground.” Dream put a hand on her king, still feeling a bit dizzy. “I think I can manage a few more blows.” She gave him a weary smile.

Zodiac attempted to remain calm and scouted his surroundings, starting to hound down that wretched Demon who dropped his queen. If he was still alive, Zodiac was planning on making him wish he wasn’t.

 

\--                                                                                            

Unfortunately, as Night predicted, something had happened and at this point he was hardly surprised. He was bit shocked at Hale’s strength, that he managed to drag both him and Snow over to where they had seen Risai fall, with his tiny little body. But otherwise, Night kind of predicted as soon as Dream and Zodiac arrived, they would literally be royally fucked.

Though Night felt nothing, he approached Risai, asking, “Are you alive?

There was no response so Night checked the Demon’s pulse. “Hm...I think he’s alive.”

Snow exclaimed. “How? We all saw the king strike him with his lightning and now here he is and his blood is everywhere!” She screamed when Risai bolted upward as if awaking from a particularly frightening dream.

“He sure is durable.” Hale sighed.

“A-are you alright?” stammered Snow.

“No, yeah, I just passed out for a moment there. The fall kinda hurt, but otherwise, I’m great.”

Night, unconvinced, shook his head. “No, I don’t think so.”

“Oh, so my skull might be fractured, it’s whatever.” Risai said, waving a nonchalant hand. “It’s fine—”

“Watch out!” Hale shouted. A ball of flames headed towards them and he pulled his sister out of the way, using the woods and camouflage to hide their presence.

Similarly Risai apparently had the strength to tackle Night of the way. “Huh, maybe you are alright.”

“I’m sure I’ve had much worse.” Risai replied with a grin. “Are you alright?”

“Yeah. Also what could be worse than being shocked by lightning?”

The king’s rage filled voice cut in. “Everything I’m about to do to him!” Zodiac snatched him from on top of Night and threw him against the nearest tree. Night thinking fast tried to distract Zodiac, kicking the back of his legs so that he would stumble. It bothered the king enough to avert his attention from Risai to him. The king narrowed his eyes.

“You both are foolish. You may distract me from one another, but it only prolongs your deaths!” A claw threatened to rip Night’s face off, but this time, he was able to avoid being hurt. He stayed light on his feet so he could quickly evade Zodiac’s attacks, dodging the combination of punches and even breaths of fire.

However, Zodiac knew he couldn’t keep dodging his assault forever. His stamina allowed him to tire Night out and eventually he swung his tail at him, knocking Night to the ground once more. Calmly, he lifted Night into the air by his neck, squeezing his already abused neck. Night clawed desperately at Zodiac’s hands and kicked him uselessly as the life was choked out of him.

“It hurts, doesn’t it?”Zodiac said.  “I could snap your neck— like you did my child— save you the pain, but I won’t. I want you to suffer and look me in the eye so you can feel my rage!” Zodiac crushed his throat a bit harder and Night whimpered the last breath he could muster before the feeling of impending death washed over him again. And Night decided he would accept it. He was tired anyway. Tired of one bad decision leading to another bad decision. The spiral would finally end.

Although he swore he heard Risai shout something. Something that sounded suspiciously like “You fucking idiot!” but what did he know, he was dying. Probably hearing things too.

Though for some reason, his hand had grasped Zodiac’s firmly. A lot firmer than he thought he would be able to since he was about out of air. His other hand came up and claws dug into the king’s arm, drawing blood, which seemed to shock Zodiac as well as Night. He had already given up on living in his mind but his body was moving on its own entirely. And it hurt a lot strangely. Night was more than sure it wasn’t because he was being choked.

No, it was because his body was literally changing. The fur that covered a great portion of his body falling out and being rapidly replaced with black and green scales

 

Zodiac released Night and watched with interest as he transformed before him. Night’s body had become significantly longer, his form now looking more a snake than his usual cat like appearance, though  his head still resembled that of a panther, despite having been completely scaled over. Night, now a beast, towering about half the height of the tall forest trees,  glowered at Zodiac with hateful red eyes.

“Ho, I seemed to have pushed you to your limit.” Zodiac observed. “It will not help you. Transforming has great risks—” With a screech sounding like a mix between a growl and a hiss, Night swatted him out of his sight.

Zodiac broke through a few trees before he figured that he should probably quit monologuing from now on and focus on the kill. He unfurled his wings to blow off the the shreds of tree bark and briskly walked back toward Night. Except the other problem he still hadn’t taken care of was now roaming free. Zodiac had decided no more distractions, only death.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> btw i hate this story


	7. Chapter 7

** Chapter 7 **

It was shortly after they had resorted to hiding that Snow and Hale realized they weren’t alone. The king may have been distracted with Night and Risai but the queen was not six feet away, walking slowly and looking around cautiously.

“You know, I can smell you two.” she stated. She lunged in their direction and the two hit the ground with a hard thud, allowing Dream to yank Snow up by the arm. “There you are, you brat!” She punched Snow in her face, feeling her nose break from the blow. She laughed at the tears coming from Snow’s eyes. “Pathetic. Don’t tell me that disappearing act is all you’ve got?”

“No, you bitch!” Snow bit down on Dream’s arm as hard as she could, and then she chomped down harder until her fangs were scraping against bone. She pulled a chunk of the queen’s skin off and spit it to the ground, licking her bloodied face. Dream screeched in horror and in pain. Part of the bone and muscle of her forearm was now visible and blood gushed from the wound.

“You—! I’ll rip out your throat!” Dream cried as she dove for the tiny Demon again, getting in a kick and practically punting her across the ground. Hale came to defend, talon clawing Dream’s face. She turned to him, fury blatant in her gaze, but Hale didn’t let this scare him off. He lifted himself in the air with his wings, just enough to assail the queen with both of his talons, scratching her face violently. He finished her off with a roundhouse kick, and with the help of his wings, he had an extra bit of power that sent Dream flying.

Hale immediately went to his sister who was groaning in pain on the ground. “Are you just gonna lay there or am I going to do all the fighting here?”

Snow whimpered, “I’m sorry. She just got the upper hand for a moment.” She hissed when she touched her nose, already swollen and bruised.

“You gotta a little something on your face there.” Hale joked, pointing out her entire face, covered in blood. She giggled, a sign that she was still good to fight.

 

Dream’s ominous laughter cut through their moment. “You little imps will regret ever crossing my path.”

The siblings saw her frightful, cerise eyes and the thin trails of blood flowing down her face, making her look like a war goddess, and knew they had to get serious. “You gotta live for Storm, you know.” said Hale.

“Shut up.” Snow retorted. “But you are right. We need to be careful. She’s almost as quick as the king but I’m sure if we get our bait and switch routine running, we’ll be alright.”

In the blink of an eye, Dream closed the distance between her and the other two and swipe her injured arm at them. Unfortunately for her it only met the air as Hale and Snow went camo almost immediately and withdrew from the queen to where they could quickly hatch a scheme.

Hale began, “I’m assuming my darling sister has a plan in mind?”

“You would be assuming right. She’s only fast on the ground. But what about in the air?” Hale’s look of interest begged her to continue. “I’ll be relying on you for surprise aerial assaults—”

“I can smell your blood, tiny Demon.” Dream taunted. Her voice sounded awfully close to the two so Snow hurried along.

“I’ll be distracting her while I’m in the trees. That way she’ll have to go out of her way to get to me and she won’t be as quick. Can you manage attacking with all the leaves and branches?”

“Easy.” Hale confirmed confidently and he shot into the air. Snow herself scurried up the nearest tree trunk and waited.

“You two can’t hide forever.” Dream said, growing impatient. Snow intentionally made as much noise as possible as she crawled through branches, catching the queen’s attention. She smirked and followed the path of falling leaves, jumping up to the branch, in front of Snow. She took a chance and grabbed where she figured Snow was. She figured right.

“Your stealth skills are surprisingly lacking, imp.”

Snow laughed. “And your common sense skills are lacking too, Your Majesty.” Dream had no time to react to Hale crashing into her at top speed, hurtling her away into the  ground; and she tumbled until another tree trunk stopped her momentum.

“Shit, you might have just taken her out completely, Hale!” Snow remarked once Hale had perched next to her on the branch. “Could have saved some for me—”

 

Snow was interrupted by loud hissing screech, followed more trees tumbling over from something crushing through them. “What the hell?!”

“Was that the king?” Hale asked.

“I don’t—”  Snow cut herself off because out of the corner of her eye she saw Risai, who was moving perfectly fine despite having been injured so severely, waving his hands wildly at the sky, as if trying to get someone’s attention. “What the hell— what is that?” she exclaimed. The two siblings got closer and were startled by the snake beast, towering over Risai and now had its gaze fixed to him. It lashed out, body lurching forward and it swiped at Risai with a clawed hand.

Risai dodged, claws barely ripping out strands of his hair. “Whoa! Hey, Night! Listen, I know you’re really angry, but can you maybe not do that?”

“That thing is Night!?” Snow screamed catching both Risai’s attention and, unfortunately Night’s as well. His body slithered toward her too quickly for her to react and Risai’s warning had been said far too slowly before Night’s claw was all she could see. Hale dove at Snow, grabbing her and gliding to the next safest spot.

“Why is he attacking us?” Hale asked once Risai had caught up to them.

“I told you already, you aren’t thinking clearly once you transform and Night’s really angry.” responded Risai. “ I thought he would listen to me at least.”

“Maybe he remembers you choking him.” Hale brought up.

“Is there a way for him to calm down?” asked Snow. “You know before he kills us?”

Risai shrugged, watching Night like a hawk. “We could try knocking him out. I would say that would be the easiest way since we can’t hold his attention long enough for him to process that we’re on his side. He can understand us but he’s just not listening. He’s in full attack mode.”

Hale spoke, “Well I say we use him and have him attack our enemy instead.”

Snow nodded. “I was thinking the same thing.” They both looked at Risai expectantly and he smirked.

“I guess you’re expecting me to lure him to the king.” he stated.

“Speaking of which, he hasn’t attacked us yet so I’m a bit worried.” Snow pointed out.

 

—

Zodiac was well aware he probably could have murdered about three people and maybe even the one who went all beastial, but before he too went full attack mode, he spotted his precious wife, bloody and unconscious. His eyes widened at the horrible sight and rushed over to her. He checked her pulse but Zodiac knew that his queen could never be taken down by such a squalid group of Demons. They were almost as incompetent as his guards.

“My dearest,” he called out, “you must awaken. Please.” he shook her softly and she stirred, eyes fluttering weakly.

“Z...Zodiac…?” Dream tried to move, scratching up the trunk of the tree to steady herself. “I-I let them get to me. I couldn’t take as much as I thought I could. ”

“No, no, my love, you did fine.” Zodiac hurried out as he lifted Dream’s battered body into his arms. “Do not worry. You have done enough for now. I want you to rest.”

“No, I refuse!”

“My queen—” Zodiac was going to fight her on this, after all he cared so deeply about her, however, the giant snake creature that was Night interrupted  them. Zodiac immediately took to the sky. Night spotted the king and screeched angrily, trying to swat him out of the air as if the king were an annoying pest; the king however, expertly maneuvered the air, avoiding Night’s claws and incoming trees alike. Something,the king later identified as Risai, darted past him and soon after, Hale, giving Zodiac a hard time. They sped by him several times, circling the king so that he was completely distracted from Night, who had a claw hurtling toward him, threatening to crush his body.

Dream cried, “Zodiac, behind you!”

Zodiac reacted quick, but not quick enough, feinting only to have his wing snagged by a nail, tearing his wing even further. Dream lurched out from his grip with a small yelp, and fell back towards the ground, tumbling to a halt.

Risai once again zoomed past the king, this time grabbing a hold of him, allowing Nights claw to tear through the king’s wing completely. Furious, Zodiac threatened to flood Risai’s face with flames or even lightning but Risai released his hold on him. Night caught him with his newly elongated body and closed in, constricting in on the king’s body. Zodiac resisted with all his might, angrily torching Night, however it had no effect. He thought lightning ought to work but he would end up shocking himself as well.

He cried out in pain, but mostly exasperation.

 

Dream, after recovering from her fall, forced herself to stand after hearing her husband distressed cry. She ran toward the beast crushing her king as fast as she could so when she transformed into her Demon form, just a bit tinier than Night’s form but still powerful, she tackled him so that his grip on Zodiac let up and tore at Night’s scaled body with sharp canines. Blood spewed about as Dream tore into Night. The spectators didn’t know what to make of this new fight between beasts— Night wrapping the entirety of his body around Dream, who was irately clawing and biting at Night, however with the presence of his scales, the assault was half as effective as it could have been.

“Should we get involved?” Hale pondered aloud.

Risai hovering near him thought on it. “I’m not exactly sure that Night will be fine but we probably don’t want to get between a fight of that calibre.” A bolt of lightning shot up from beneath the two flying Demons, nearly hitting them. Risai smirked wildly while Hale was startled half to death. He wasn’t so sure about Risai but had the king’s aim been any better, he would have been dead for sure. “I guess His Majesty is a bit lonely down there.”

Risai glided down to entertain Zodiac, Hale following, but instead of teasing that king a little as he planned, he was met with a brutal beatdown. Zodiac wasted no time pulling Risai out of the air and bashing his head into the ground several times; then, to finish him off, Zodiac jabbed a hole through his stomach. Blood pooled around Risai’s body. Hale took a tentative step back,catching Zodiac’s attention. Scarlet eyes pierced through steel blue ones. Hale was petrified until the king sped toward him. Hale jumped into the air trying to fly away, but Zodiac’s speed was unreal, as he caught up and yanked him from the air as well, pinning Hale to the ground.

Hale couldn’t breath, or to be more accurate he was hyperventilating to the point where he thought there could never be enough air to calm himself from whatever was about to happen. And he was right.

There was a pause, as if Zodiac was figuring out what he should do to Hale. Then it was all clear. Zodiac took his time, taking one of the boy’s wings and slowly peeling it backward. “No, no, please!” Hale lowered whatever pride he had so he could beg. The king however, refused to hear him out.

It was only natural he’d scream. Hale imagined getting your wing ripped off to someone without them would be like getting an arm or leg cut off, very slowly and with a very small rusty knife. He pounded into the ground and scraped until his nails were dull and dirty. Tears were ran wildly across his face. The pain wasn’t ending anytime soon either. He screamed for the umpteenth time as Zodiac unhurriedly began tearing off the other wing. Somehow it had hurt more than the first and Hale’s voice was worked raw from his screaming.

He heard the terrible thump of his appendages hitting the ground in front of him. His beautiful gray plumage, brown scattered about, were now laying in plain sight, stained with his blood. Hale thought seeing this was somehow more painful than getting them ripped off. However his suffering didn’t end just yet.

In one quick motion, Zodiac had flipped Hale over and swiped a sharp nail across his jugular and let the blood spew. In a panic Hale wheezed, pressing his hand hard against the wound, and to the best of his ability, he scooted away from the king— as far as he could before his own wings tripped him up. His hand, now smothered red slipped away from his neck, easily allowing blood to flow freely outward.

He saw the king’s eyes, red and emotionless. “Do not fret child.” He spoke. “You will be dead soon enough.” The words were strangely comforting and he embraced death as the king walked away from his soon to be corpse.

However, when Snow, his dear older sister, found him, probably worried after hearing all his screaming, he didn’t want to die anymore. His eyes welled up with tears and he moved a hand to his throat to hold in whatever blood remained. “Hale…?” Snow took in the sight of her brother dying on the ground and the wings once attached to his body. Face contorted in horror, she hurried over to him, kneeling beside his body and cradling his head. “Hale, oh my god! Oh my god! Shit!” She too pressed a hand against Hale’s neck to prolong his life, but it was no use and blood got all over her. “No, no, no! Hale, please don’t die!” An idea struck her, “Please, Hale, you need to transform.”

Hale laughed, but in his situation it came out garbled and blood bubbled from his mouth.

“Goodbye.”

“No, don’t say that! Hale? Hale!” But he was already gone. The light had faded from his eyes and Snow’s little brother had died. “NO! No, Hale, please! Hale…” Snow’s face was a mess of tears and snot as she screamed in frustration and despair. “I never should have let you come along…”

 

After taking the time she could mourning over her brother, Snow looked up,  finally noticing Risai’s still body as well with a pool of blood accompanying him. She trailed over to Risai looking for any sign that he was alive. The slight movement of his chest and the somewhat slow but steady heartbeat she felt proved this to be true. “H-how are you…?” Her question trailed off as the battle between Night and Dream drew closer. Snow hoisted the Demon over her shoulder and tried to get out of the way.

Then she remembered Hale, disgusted with herself that she would just leave him there, she went back, also picking up his body and finding a place that was out of the way from the clashing of the Demons.

 

Night wasn’t faring so well in his fight, from what Snow could tell. He was fierce, wrapping his body around the queen, trying to hold her down, even crush her to death, but even then, she would scurry out of Night’s hold. Now she danced around him as he struck out at her with sharp claws and even sharper incisors, successfully evading all of Night’s attacks until she found an opening and struck.

“God, he’s losing!” Snow exclaimed. “What do I do? _What do I do?”_ She asked herself. There was little she could do. There was no way she could take on Dream if Night couldn’t in his transformed state; Zodiac was god know where at the moment; Risai is out of service and _her brother was dead._ The only thing she could do was watch. Or—

“Transform…” she murmured to herself. If she transformed she could probably help Night since she was more sane than he was at the moment; she even had all the incentive she needed to do so. Whether she could somehow gather all her rage and strength to actually do it, however, seemed unlikely.

That is unless she put herself in the danger.

“Okay.” Snow mentally talked herself into doing that exactly, putting herself into the fray, which could lead to her death or something, as she moved Risai and Hale somewhere else, just praying their bodies wouldn’t get crushed with all the shit that’s happening. Then after her mental pep talk, she stupidly walked toward the two beasts, not getting very far because the missing king, had appeared so suddenly before her.

“I have been searching for you, tiny Demon.” Zodiac told her, his ominous smile punctuating the sentence. Snow had a feeling she had little chance of surviving this encounter. It was perfect. And terrifying.

The king was swift, contrary to before where he seemed to monologue to the point where he left himself defenseless, this confrontation was met with a quick jab to the abdomen. His clawed hands dug into her and she screamed bloody murder as she felt the king’s hand piercing through her body. Oh it was hell, and she knew that she couldn’t survive it, unlike Risai for some reason, which left her laughing. She couldn’t tell if she was laughing because it was a panic reaction to the king jabbing his hand through her or if it was because she was always laughing at anything and everything. Probably the former. Maybe both.

Zodiac, disturbed by her laughter tried to remove his arm but Snow latched onto it. “Let me go.” He demanded calmly. She refused instead laughing some more.

“I know you wanted him to suffer,” Snow said, uneasily; she really was in a lot of pain, “but at least I got to say goodbye to him. Thank you.” She was staring confidently into his neon eyes. She could see the hatred he clearly felt for her but also...she thought she saw a twinge of regret; then again she was dying so she could be seeing things.

Zodiac attempted to remove his arm once more but she clung tighter with new found strength, and for some reason was compelled to chomp into his arm with strong jaws. Snow could feel it— her body changing rapidly and growing.

It was harrowing.


	8. Chapter 8

Chapter 8

 

Zodiac had thrown aside Snow’s new found transformation with all his might, grasping at his bleeding side. He took in the girl’s new form. She was big enough to tower over him, which wasn’t much honestly, and looked mostly chameleon, save her new grown nails, that made her hands and feet look like overgrown pincer; her maw was canine, long sharp fangs protruding dangerously and gnawing on his now severed arm. He was ready for her to mindlessly attack but instead, to his surprise, she went straight for Dream and Night. Zodiac figured that she must have remained sane even after transforming, and that this had probably been her plan all along; and more embarrassingly so he had fallen for it— and lost an arm, so soon after his wing! He had decided he had better not dwell on it. Dream was in danger of being hurt and he would not allow it.

 

Snow had cut in between the two, pushing Night aside, ramming Dream with her new grown horns, and finding the nearest limb that belonged to Dream to chomp onto. It was a leg. Dream was unable to react to the sudden intrusion and was subjected to Snow’s assault as her pincer like, zygodactyl claws dug into her shoulders and her jaws tore furiously at Dream’s leg. Snow’s form was smaller than her’s but Dream was still unable to move or gather enough energy to quickly heal her wounds. She yowled pathetically as Snow brutalized her.

The cry was enough to send Zodiac into a frenzy. He jumped up high enough to land a powerful kick to Snow’s snout, pushing her away from Dream, who immediately reverted back to her human formation. Still midair, Zodiac managed to catch her and land safely.

Taking in the sight of her gravely injured body didn’t sit right with Zodiac, threatening a transformation as parts of of his spine sprung up from from his back, bloody and sharp. It was a rather peculiar feeling. Though when Dream’s eyes fluttered open. He calmed down greatly, though it seemed his newly formed spine spikes were permanent. “Thank god!”

“Zodiac?” She tried to move from his hold, but quickly realized it wasn’t so easy. “Wha—? I...I transformed to help you, why,” her voice was cracking now, “why is it that I still need rescuing?”

“My love, please hush. You have done fine and, quite frankly, enough.” He told her, his voice was low and calm and yet angry, somehow still managing to calm Dream. “You are injured badly I must ask that you rest.” He carefully slid her to her feet and, as she limped to a steady position, she finally noticed the condition of her husband.

“Zodiac! Your wing— your arm!” She exclaimed.

“I am fine. This will not stop me.”

“But, Zodiac—!”

“It will not stop me!” He bellowed and turned his back on her. “Please, stay here.” Dream protested against his orders, but, though it pained him, he ignored her and hurried back into the fray.

Though once he had returned, oddly enough, the beasts were gone.

 

\--

 

The king had grabbed his queen and left, that much Snow could handle. She could not handle, however, Night suddenly deciding that she was the next thing on his list that he wanted to maim.  She feinted when he shot his body at her like a cannon but she couldn’t keep that up forever. She couldn’t stand up against Night and she wasn’t going to. She remembered what Risai had said earlier, thinking knocking him out might just work but Night was too quick and didn’t look as if he was just gonna let her so much as tap him on the head.

Weirdly enough something had literally flew past her, circling around Night, a strip of yellow cloth trailing behind whatever it was. Snow thought her eyes were playing tricks on her. That couldn’t be…? She thought to herself.

She wasn’t expecting Night to stop attacking her so abruptly and even more so, didn’t expect him to return to his human form. He would have fallen too had whatever had flown in front of her not caught him. Snow’s eyes tracked whoever this person was to the ground and who she landed next to filled Snow with so much delight, she herself had also reverted back to her human form. She shrunk to the ground, tackling into his arms happily. “Final! You came back!”

He had caught her awkwardly, trying not to drop the petite Demon. “Yes, I’m back. Why I came back, I wish I knew. Why are you crying?”

“Because I missed you and so much shit has happened to us.”

“I’ll bet. You guys can’t get anything done without me.”  
  


Snow observed the Demon who had flown in and was currently trying to wake Night up; she was blonde, though it was clearly dyed as her roots were showing. Parts of a lion and a dove didn’t tell her much but Snow had sworn she had seen this chick before. “Do I know you?”

The Demon looked her way and gave a skittish response. “S-sorry if I startled you or something. Oh! I’m Day. I’m Night’s sister. Nice to meet you.” She gave a smile that seemed far too pleasant given the current situation.

“I ran into her,” Final explained while taking his scarf back from Day, “while I was in the process of leaving forever. She recognized me and then I explained that I didn’t give two shits about her stupid brother,” Final was currently glaring at Night, “but eventually I felt bad because you did nothing wrong Snow. And neither did Hale. Only Night. Speaking of, where is Hale?” Snow expression sadden greatly and Final took in the blood covering her clothes, now knowing what she wanted to say. “Shit, I’m sorry Snow. I—”

“No, there was nothing you could have done.” Snow cut in. “I hid him and Risai somewhere relatively safeish?”

“Risai?” Final said with obvious disgust. “That guy is still around?”

Snow muttered, “Somehow…” Final made a sound of disgust and Snow couldn’t figure out if it was because he had just learned about Risai still being around or because Night was waking. If she had to guess, it was probably both.

“Hey!” Day chimed. “How was your nap?”

 

Night took a moment to process. He thought he might have been dreaming because his sister and Final were staring right at him. Then he realized he wasn’t dreaming and became even more confused. He snapped at Final, quite a feat since he felt absolutely drained. “Why the hell did you come back!?”

“Well it wasn’t to save your sorry ass if that’s what you’re thinking.” Final said and crossed his arms stubbornly. Snow resisted with all her might to point out that he did in fact just do that .

“And you Day! Why, of all the people, why are you here too!?”

“I know! I get it, you wanted me to be safe but I couldn’t just let you die.”

“Yes! Yes you really could have!” Night shouted. He turned back to Final, “And you...you could have been long gone by now but you came back and  brought my fucking sister into it!”

Final, sick of Night’s bickering, told him, “It’s time for you to get over it. We’re here now. You’re welcome.”

“You’re going to die!”

Snow spoke up. “Night, it’s great you have your voice back and all and I would love to hear you shout all day but honestly, can you not?”

He blinked as if just figuring out that he was in fact yelling and not rasping out his words like he was before. His abused throat had actually been healed and he was amazed.”That’s really weird…” his voice was now hushed.

“Yeah, I had a broken nose and a hole in my stomach not five minutes ago.” Snow said.

“I actually wasn’t talking about the healing. I have scales under my throat. Actually I have scales in a lot of places where fur used to be. And...I have fingers— it’s really throwing me off.”

“Now that you mention it…” Snow touched the three new horns that had grown from her forehead in a triangular pattern. “These are new. I think I skimmed something about Demon’s having their appearances permanently changed after transforming, though I didn’t spend too much time reading about transformation. For some reason, I didn’t think it would be useful. I guess because we’ve never done it until now.”

Final’s patience was running thin. “Can we focus?...Also what do you mean we’ve never done it? Wasn’t I the transformation trump card before?”

“Okay, but you never transformed transformed. You just kinda went wild and attacked anyone you saw. Glad to see you've got that under control now. ”

Final rolled his eyes. Night started to get twitchy. “The king is nearby. I can sense him.”  There wasn’t enough time to get away. Zodiac had already made his appearance. He narrowed his eyes at Final and Day, taking note of two more who were to become victims of his wrath.

Quickly, Final charged at the king, spouting orders of retreat. Day grabbed Night and flew off and Snow took to her camouflage once again. Zodiac didn’t want to partake in these Demons’ foolishness again. As Final rapidly approached, Zodiac prepared a lightning strike, however Final caught on quickly and managed to dodge the bolt and managed to get a blow on the Demon king. He proceeded to assail the king with punches to his gut, finishing off the assault by grabbing a hold of his horns and swinging him away.

The King recovered, and charged back at Final, swinging with his remaining arm, managing to get a blow, but Final, who had both of his limbs, had the advantage and returned the blow with a punch of his own. Zodiac’s head flew back and he paused a moment, spitting blood onto the ground before his eyes slid back over to Final. He gave the king a cocky smirk, challenging the other Demon. The king accepted.

He lashed out again with his arm and Final dodged. He wasn’t expecting the king’s tail to trip him up and clumsily stumbled backward, allowing the king to latch hold of one of his arms. It wasn’t a problem, as Final easily threw a kick into Zodiac’s jaw. The king’s grip loosened and Final ripped his arm free, shortly after throwing him another punch to the face.

Zodiac had staggered once again. He didn’t sense in time Snow’s camoed self, tripping him up, allowing him to fall ungracefully to the ground. Final was coming in for another blow and for a moment, Zodiac couldn’t get up. The newly grown spikes protruding from his back had him stuck in the ground. Growling, he flailed his hand out randomly until he grabbed, what he assumed was Snow since she was still invisible, slamming her to the ground, satisfied with her hurt cry.

Final jumped and came down, intending to crush the king under his feet, however he was not expecting to be thrown back by Dream, throwing her weight at him as he was coming down. Final fell, but made great effort to recover and grab Snow before something could happen to her, finding refuge in the foliage above. Luckily the king was too preoccupied to give chase.

 

After some much needed help getting up, Zodiac turned to Dream with what was akin to fury. “What are you doing? I told you not to interfere!”

Not appreciating his tone Dream narrowed her eyes and told him off. “I came to help you,” she answered dauntlessly. “I refuse to allow my husband to fight on his own when he is clearly at a disadvantage.”

Scowling deeply, Zodiac cried, “I am not at a disadvantage! They are just pests, I can handle it!”

“My king you are missing an arm and wing,” Dream countered adamantly while remaining level-headed.  “I’m staying.” Her stubbornness seemed to make Zodiac angrier but she didn’t care.

With a reluctant sigh Zodiac said, “If you must…” And began his hunt for Final, Snow, or any other Demon affiliated with them.

 

“They seemed to have worked out their issues so let’s hurry up.” Final spoke quietly.  The trees were concealing their presence but only because neither the king or queen were paying attention to them, so Final was sure it wouldn’t last long. Day silently broke through the foliage and landed on a branch in front of them, still carrying Night around, startling both Snow and Final.

“Sorry, sorry!” She whisper-yelled while Night crawled out of her arms onto the branch. He seemed completely fazed by his newly developed fingers.

Final brushed it off. “It’s fine. This is good— us all together like this. I just went toe to toe with the king and he doesn’t really appear to be in good shape. He’s slower than usual. The missing arm and wing is also very good for us. This way he isn’t as mobile.”

Snow grinned cheekily. “All thanks to me. And Night I guess.” She looked at him, thinking her quip would draw a reaction out of him but he mainly looked tired and confused. “What’s up?” she asked him.

Night narrowed his eyes in confusion. Did he miss something? Final had said they were all here but Hale wasn’t. He observed Snow’s outfit, covered in dried blood and swiftly deduced that Hale was probably dead. Night decided he wouldn’t ask. “Nothing, just tired.” he finally told her. “What’s your plan Final? You have one don’t you?”

Final blinked in surprise, obviously not expecting Night to say this. “Y-yeah, I do. It’s actually pretty simple. We have to all attack at the same time. They can’t possibly keep up with the four of us together in their state. Do you think you two could manage that?” he was looking at Night and Snow. “I know you guys probably used up a lot of energy transforming…”

“I’m fine!” Snow chimed. Night could see through her false claim but since they were planning on making it out of this entire situation alive, they were going to have to get over the exhaustion.

“I’m good to go too.” Night eventually responded. Day gave Final a cheerful grin as an answer and Final nodded.

 

The harsh smell of smoke assaulted the Demons’ noses; as if their mutual agreement had triggered some sort of reaction, the king of course was the result.  

“He’s burning the forest down, we’ve gotta move.” Night ordered. He hopped to the ground, everyone else following suit. Zodiac and Dream were standing just a few feet away from where they had landed. Night scrutinized the two, taking notes with what Final had told them not too long ago. In his honest opinion, the both of them still looked quite terrifying, even with their injuries. But there was an something about them he couldn’t quite place, but something nonetheless, convincing Night that they might have the advantage here.

Final was the first to engage, charging boldly at the queen. She seemed to take the challenge seriously meeting Final in the middle, where they clashed, throwing heavy punches and furious kicks at each other. Snow and Day took to distracting the king. Night stayed back, assessing who he should actually go after.

Zodiac had almost killed him earlier when he wasn’t as exhausted as he was currently, so the queen seemed like a more viable target. Day and Snow could probably handle themselves...for now. Cautiously eyeing Final’s fight with Dream, Night waited until the right moment to pounce, successfully pinning the queen underneath him, claws swiping furiously at her face and drawing blood.

Dream hurled Night off of her only to be attacked by Final shortly after, though she react quickly enough to evade the boy and glared at Night before her.

“You..!” she snarled. The blood dripping from her face made her look that much more frightening. Night thought somehow, this woman always seemed to look intimidating, whether she had the advantage or not. “I’ll kill you!” Dream charged with a barrage of punches, kicks, and swipes. In Night’s condition, he couldn’t do much but play defensively, trying to block and evade her attacks until he could find an opening.

As if answering his prayers, Final comes up from behind, tripping Dream up and causing her to fall. The queen makes a quick recovery and grabs Final by the neck, her speed catching him off guard. Dream proceeded to throw Final into the ground. She slammed his head against the terrain a few times until he was unconscious—or dead, Night couldn’t tell—before turning her wild, angry gaze back to Night.

His blood ran cold. This wasn’t good. Final was unconscious and the forest fire was starting to catch up with them. He thought about grabbing Final and making a break for it, but then again he may have been a bit too obvious about doing that because Dream had already took a step in front of Final before charging wildly at Night, knocking him aside.

This wasn’t right, Night thought. She couldn’t be this fast after transforming. She had to be tired, yet she was still so fast. He tried his damndest to track her but was just met with blows to the stomach when he thought she would go for the face. It didn’t seem like she was going to kill him at the moment, just beat him senseless. Which was good, it gave him time to think. But then again, he had to think fast. Flames were closing in where they were, but it didn’t look like the queen gave any thought to it. She was too busy pummeling him.

Night decided to go back to his old plan—making a break for it. He dashed toward Final, who he could see was stirring a bit trying to scoop him up. Dream, however, was right on Night’s tail. He strategically fell to his back, anticipating Dream to pounce onto him, and when she did, Night brought his legs up and kicked her into the burning woods. He didn’t think twice, grabbing Final and trying to find a breakaway from the forest.

Something darted past Night, toward the fire, but he was more concerned about finding an exit rather than finding out whatever ran past him.

 

Somehow, Night made it out, both he and Final still intact. A few minor burns here and there, but alive. They’d made it back the streets of the ruins. Night put Final to his feet. “Can you stand?” On closer inspection Night saw that quite a bit of blood was coming from Final’s head. “You’re bleeding a lot…”

“Yeah, I’m fine I think.” Final answered though after rubbing his forehead and seeing the blood smeared on his hand, Final paled quite a bit. “Maybe not.”

Night looked like he wanted to say something but Day had dropped from the air, Snow in her arms. They looked mostly unscathed.

“Hey we all made it!” Day said, her cheerful tone terribly out of place.

Snow looked at Final, “Whew, you don’t look so good.”

“Yeah? Back at ya.” Final retorted taking in her badly bruised face. “Guess they really can’t help tossing you around like a rag doll.” Final said which had Snow snorting back her laughter. “Where did the king go?”

Snow shrugged. “Beats me. Day and I were doing a good job kicking his ass—I mean this girl is surprisingly good at combat. Then the king just ran off.”

“He ran off?” Night repeated, wondering if it was the king who darted past him before.

“It might be nothing, but the king seemed distracted when we were fighting…”

“Distracted how?” prompted Night.

Day recalled her fight. “It’s just occasionally he would look like he was looking somewhere else. I dunno. Like I said it might be nothing.”

Night wasn’t so sure that was true.

 


	9. Chapter 9

The four Demons waited in silence, watching the fire consume the forest, expecting the king any moment.

“Hale was in there…” Snow sighed sorrowfully.

Night grimaced “I’m sorry. I really fucked up. I got us all into this with my shitty ass ideas.” he blurted out. Everyone was overwhelmingly confused at his confession.

“Why are you apologizing now?” Final asked, head cocked.

“Because I feel guilty!” Night bit out. “Your sister is dead because of me and Hale is too, along with a bunch of other innocent people. I brought everyone into this stupid idea I had. It wasn’t even worth it.”

Day walked over and put a hand to his shoulder. Snow looked down, wanting to say something but not able to. It was silent until Final told him, “There’s nothing we can do about it now. Saying sorry won’t bring them back. We’re... just gonna have to move on.” Final sighed. “Also why the hell are you talking like we’ve already lost?”

“I’m looking at this realistically, Final. We may die.” Night said

“Probably, with that negative attitude.” Final countered.

Snow finally chimed in “Yeah, lighten up, Night.” She chuckled to herself, “Or Nighten up haha!”

Night couldn’t believe it. He’s trying to be serious. They could literally die at any given time and yet Final and Snow are just joking around.

Honestly they never change.

 

A figure was emerging quickly from the flames. As expected it was the king; his remaining wing covering up his body, folded back revealing Dream in his arm. Zodiac placed her down gently and turned to the other Demon’s with a horrific glare. There was little time to react before the king sped toward them. Day was the first the intercept him, blocking his blows, but not for long.

Somehow, Day thought, the king was attacking faster than when they were in the forest. She couldn’t keep up with his attacks and Zodiac managed to claw her stomach, making Day recoil before Zodiac kicked her to the ground, crushing her under his foot.

Final and Night stepped in; Night pushing the king away from his sister and Final charging in with a hard punch to the face. The king staggered, but only for a moment before he retaliated with a blow to Final’s stomach and knocked Night down with his tail. Zodiac turned with a breath of fire in Night’s direction—right in hisFUCKING face.

“Argh!” Night cringed, covered his face, and tried to scramble away from the area. Final held onto the king’s arm tightly to prevent him from chasing Night. Day and Snow came up to help with a sucker punch to the face and one to the stomach. Final finished him off by tossing him over his head and slamming him into the ground.

Day, Snow, and Final stood their ground with the king, keeping him away from Night who managed to crawl away, to a point where he considered himself temporarily safe.

The king had blown a wave of fire in his face and his eyes seemed to have suffered the most from it because he couldn’t see, couldn’t even manage to open them. Luckily for him, he still had his pit sensors so he wasn’t completely blind.

And speaking of, someone was getting awfully close to him. Night was hoping it was someone friendly, it was after all more likely that an ally would approach him than an enemy. So he took a chance. “Snow?” he asked tentatively.

“No.” Came the queen’s voice and at that moment, Night knew he was screwed. He had no time to react before she pushed Night down by the neck with her foot, pressing down hard to choke him. “Finally I have you,” Dream laughed bitterly. “You will regret messing with me! You will regret hurting my king! And you WILL regret killing my baby!” She replaced her foot with her hands, literally trying to squeeze the life out of Night.

However, Night refused to be choked out for a third time, overpowering Dream with his remaining strength and swiping his claws at what he assumed was her face, though her pained cry told him he assumed right. He tried to escape when her hold on him let up, but Dream wouldn’t allow it. She clawed at him, doing damage wherever she could, but overall aiming for the neck. Night threw a kick, managing to knock her away from him so he could stand, though his lack of actual sight made it hard for him to maintain a steady balance.

Even so he managed to avoid the queen’s attacks by remaining on the defensive, until he grabbed one of her arms and turned her so she was facing away from him, before he twisted the socket of her shoulder out of place.

Dream screamed but it seemed highly annoyed rather than laced with agony. The intensity of her fierce growling gave Night a clear image of her snarling with a fiery expression, blood running down her face. “I will kill you...” she murmured. Then she began repeating herself as if chanting it would make it a reality. “I will kill you. I will kill you! I will kill you!” She screamed again and broke out of Night’s grip, turning, and with her good arm, aimed sharp claws at his throat.

Night was sure he could block the blow but his train of thought was interrupted when Final had yelled at him: “Night look out!”

He couldn’t see and he didn’t know what to expect so he simply threw himself to the ground, hoping for the best. After a few moments of nothing happening, he could only wonder what had happened. From what he could tell the queen wasn’t attacking him, but instead lying on the ground next to him then the heard the king’s horrific screech.

 

\--

Zodiac was annoyed. Well, that was a tremendous understatement, but what with these pesky Demon’s still alive and him— missing limbs and exhausted completely from the continuous fighting, annoyed would suffice. However Dream, though unconscious, was exempt from the fight, which was a bit of a comfort so he would do anything in his power to fight all three of the Demon’s and kill them all.

No, wait. Three was not correct, once Zodiac thought on it. The small one whose only trick was camouflage was currently still here, fighting him. Then he remembered one of the Demon’s had run away in fear after a dose of flames to his face. Zodiac figured he would deal with him later until the awful screaming of his precious queen assaulted his ears. He risked turning to find her, only to be hit in the face once again by Final. The little monkey was getting on Zodiac’s last nerve.

He threw out his remaining wing throwing Snow and Day away from him, then turned to Final with a quick jab to the stomach, before frantically searching for Dream. He spotted her and Night, twisting her arm, the sight enraging Zodiac. He opened his mouth, charging a strong bolt of lightning for the wretch. He watched as Dream broke out of Night’s grip yelling “I will kill you!” Zodiac could only think that it wasn’t necessary for her to dirty her hands on such filth when he could handle it himself and let the bolt fly.

Zodiac thought it would have been a perfect end had the annoying monkey not warned Night. He watched in horror as Night suddenly ducked away from the bolt of lightning and Dream who was trying her damndest to kill him was struck by the bolt instead.

Zodiac froze a moment because what had happened could not have possibly have actually occurred, though his queen convulsing terribly before falling motionless to the ground broke him out of his trance and he screamed, outraged. Horrified. He rushed to her side immediately, lifting Dream into his arms, and searched hectically for a pulse.

On her neck? No. He grabbed her hand. Any pulse…please! Finally, a hand on her chest, One GODDAMN PULSE! PLEASE DO NOT DO THIS TO ME!

But there was nothing.

“No.” Zodiac refused to accept this. “NO! Dream you have to wake up!” He yelled shaking her, but the sight of her, bloodied eyes and mouth and motionless body made his heart wrench and Zodiac screamed once again, tears immediately flooding his eyes. He had killed his queen. He had done this.

No...Zodiac darted his eyes around wildly, to Night and the other Demons surrounding him, looking at him hesitant and confused.They did this! THEY CAUSED ALL OF THIS!

Zodiac shouted at them, “You annoying WHELPS! Look at what you have done! Why must you hurt me so!? You have taken my arm and wing. You have already taken my dear child and now my beloved queen! What more do you want! Do you intend to take my remaining child from me as well!?”

Day, Snow, Final, and Night all remained silent, not exactly sure what to expect now.

 

“You will all pay.”

 

Zodiac turned his head upward screaming wildly and he began to transform. His skin turned green and breaking away to scales, clawed hands and feet became larger and more deadly. His wings regenerated until they were perfectly reformed, his body elongated greatly and grew, until Zodiac had become larger than anything the four Demons had ever seen.

He was an enormous fucking dragon, the length of his body destroying what was left of the ruins and running even longer than that. Any slight movement left the Demons scurrying away so that they weren’t crushed.

“Wha-what is happening?” Night was asking.

Zodiac’s wings flapped until he took off into the sky. The gusts from his wings practically blow the four Demons off their feet. His long body circled around until his dragon maw face toward the ground. His body seemed to illuminate red from his belly up to his mouth and Final spoke up.

“Oh, geez. We need to move.”  He basically hauled Night over his shoulder and ran while Day latched onto Snow and took to the sky. A billow of fire came from the dragon shoot the ground an charring already burned down woods and ruins.

Day darted around the flames quickly with Snow in her arms. Final however had more trouble avoiding the fire from the ground. Patches of grass caught aflame and the path of rubble Final was walking on burned his feet from the excess heat. He sighed. “Oh man, I wish I could fly.”

“What the hell is happening?” Night was asking again from over Final’s shoulder.

“Oh, you know, the usual. Zodiac transformed and is now trying to kill us.”

“That woman—the queen, is she—”

“Yeah, she’s dead. Zodiac was trying to kill you with lightning but he accidentally hit her instead. Didn’t really sit well with him.” Night took in the information silently. Final spotted an oddity. “That’s crazy.”

“What is?” Night asked.

“The queen. Her body is perfectly fine. I think the king maintained enough of his brain to avoid hitting her.”

“So, what about it?”

“We can camp out around her body is what I’m saying. It sounds strange but we’re untouchable over there.” Final ran towards Dream’s body making sure he wasn’t three feet away from her. He let Night down from his shoulder.

Zodiac saw them near her and screeched angrily in their direction. Soon after he began circling the sky erratically.

Night titled his head. “What’s he doing?”

Final shrugged. “He looks like he’s throwing a temper tantrum to be honest. He’s just flying around like he doesn’t know what to do.”

“Let’s hope he doesn’t figure it out.” Night said. Though it seemed he spoke too soon.

Zodiac had turned back toward them with another deafening cry and then came his clawed hand, swatting at them. Final had managed to duck under it, making sure Dream was still in the vicinity. However Night didn’t react quick enough and was batted through the ground, sliding and skidding far along the ground.

“Shit! Night!” Final cried.

 

Night’s body was hurting and throbbing. He couldn’t see but he knew for sure the where there was open scales and skin on his body, they had been peeled off revealing the meat of his arms and legs. Quite a few of his bones felt broken and out of place as well. He heard Final calling his name from afar. His sister and Snow’s voice broke through as well and Night thought if he could still hear them this clearly then he was far from being dead. Which kind of sucked considering how much pain he was in.

 

“Night! Night, get up!” Final was yelling at him again. He figured there was some sort of imminent danger headed his way by listening to Final’s tone, but he was taken aback by how much he could feel it. The heat of the king’s flames were so intense that it didn’t take much for him to figure out what he should be running from. Unfortunately, Night was crippled. He very much wanted to get up and move, his body however would not allow it.

“Night hold on!” It was Day this time. Night knew she wouldn’t make it in time when she was also carrying Snow. He didn’t know how many times he would have to do this in his life time but he decided he just accept his fate.

 

“Ah, ah, ah!” Night heard just before he had been swept up off his feet, quite literally.

Night took his time processing. He was definitely in the air, but it wasn’t Day. She couldn’t have made it. However, Night did recognize this heat and he had definitely spent enough time feeling up this chest. “Risai?”

“The one and only. Did you forget about me?”

“At this point I just assumed that you were dead! How the hell are you alive?!”

“Oh, I have my ways. You, on the other hand, don’t look like you are faring as well.”

Night grimaced. “Not everyone can be immortal like you apparently.”

“Night if you plan to keep fighting, you’re going to have to do something about this.” Risai was motioning to Night’s severely injured body. “You cannot move. You cannot see either from what I can tell.” Risai’s chest rocked Night with his laughter. “It is truly pitiful.”

“Laugh all you want…”

Risai turned his head and, after seeing the king was distracted with Day, flying around the dragon like an annoying pest, he landed near the remains of a crushed building wall, thinking even if they were attacked again, they could still remain relatively safe from harm. “Can you transform?”

“Again?” Night exclaimed.

“Of course again. Doing so will heal your wounds. Though, you’ve already done it once so I would assume it will not be a total recovery.”

“I’m still wiped out from the first time. I’m not sure.”

Risai considered Night’s words. “Perhaps I can be of assistance?”

Night rose a brow before he figured out the true meaning of his words. Risai simply smiled. “You just saved me and now you’re going to put me near death?”

“Only to help you.”

“And what if I die?”

“Do not allow that to happen.” Night had to think on this. His life was literally on the line here. “Decide quickly, Night. We cannot waste the little time we have.”

Night eventually let out a breath. “Do it. Just don't choke me.”

“As you wish. I apologize in advance.” Risai readied his sharp claws, head tilted as if deciding the best place to strike. He settled with the heart. Night cried out, the pain so great, his eyes, supposedly melted shut, flew open and he grasped at Risai’s hand, though reflexively, as if his hand was keeping him anchored to life. “You have to stay with me and focus on the transformation, otherwise you’ll die.” Risai calmly told him.

Any response Night would have had was lost behind his groans of pain. Teeth gritted, Night forced himself to focus, as Risai told him. He tried to clear his mind of the pain, of the fact that his vision was blurring and how incredibly numb he felt.

“Night!” Risai voice warned again, this time a much more harsh tone.

“I’m trying…!” it came out a guttural hiss which startled Risai a moment. But this was good. Risai forced his hand away from Night and watched the transformation before him. In minutes Night went from his regular humanoid form, to a giant snake beast, long body slowly coiling around Risai.

Night remained silent and motionless for several moments until Night’s red eyes glowered onto Risai’s body like a spotlight. “Are you still right in the head or are you going to try and kill me again?” Risai asked, feeling endangered within Night’s body, curling around him.

“No.” Night’s voice resonated around them. “Risai, I feel even more miserable than I did before.”

“Transforming isn’t cure all but it’s better than nothing. You are now a vital asset to killing the king.”

“Not sure how much use I will be.”

“Don't worry about it. For now you should engage. Any distraction will do. The king may be bigger now, probably stronger too, but right now he’s at his weakest mentally. His child and now his ever so precious queen are dead. His mental state of mind is in shambles; and since he is transformed, well it's amazing that he has any cognitive thought at all.” Risai flew up, observing the battle in the sky between Day and the king, though it mostly her trying to to get set ablaze. His eyes shifted to the ground where Dream’s body lay. “That woman. He is protecting her body.” Risai gaze shifted suddenly, just noticing the figure in front of him and Night. Risai smirked knowingly

and landed to the ground.

Final glared at the Demon. “You’re still alive? What the hell are you doing to Night?”

“I’ve done nothing. He’s perfectly fine.”

“He’s transformed again because you tried to kill him!” Final shouted.

Risai pouted. It was true, but his intentions weren’t malicious as Final thought them to be. He dodged a swing from the redhead and grabbed his arm. “Look, boy, as you can see, Night is fine. I am not attacking him and he isn’t attacking me. There is no quarrel between us. Speak Night.”

Night’s head turned toward the scene, as if he had just realized what was happening. “Ah, right. Final, it’s okay. I’m alright.”

Final, still angry, asked: “Why is this guy still around? I don’t trust him.”

Risai cut in. “I understand that you detest me for obvious reasons, but I have given no reason for any one of you to distrust me. I have been honest and open about my intentions to everyone here.”

“That doesn’t matter!” Final growled. “You were working for the king before! You..you—“

“Killed your sister? But that is all behind us now.” Risai ended his sentence with a smile infuriating Final.

“No it’s not!” Final yelled and, blinded by rage, grabbed Risai by his hair.  “Listen—“

“No, you listen,” Risai said before giving Final the chance to finish what he was saying; he was startled by how Risai’s demeanor suddenly changed. “I am here with you all now, fighting against the king. I will see to it that most of you if not all of you make it out alive. If you are going to be a pest because of what I did to your sister, then you may want to leave now before the king or even I kill you. Now if you would let go of my hair.” Risai ordered but knocked it away before Final could react.

             

Risai ordered: “Night you are to initiate with the king.”

“Alone?”

“Do not worry. I will join you soon.” Risai turned to Final, who glared back. “You, you should be ready for what happens.”

Final scoffed. “How vague.”

“I am aware of your strength,” Risai began to clarify, “If all goes right, I want you to deliver the final blow.”

The redhead crossed his arms. “Is that all? You want me to sit back and wait around?”

Risai gave him a grin, though tempered told him, “If that’s what you’d like to call it.”

Final wanted to fight him more but Night wouldn’t allow any more conflict between them. “Final, for now can you just go with it? Please.”

“Tch! Fine.” He growled, marching angrily back to Dream’s body, where it was supposedly safe.

“Night you’re still here.” Risai observed.

“I was just wondering, if I were to get really angry or something while fighting—“

“You could possibly lose yourself as well. Don’t do that.”

“I see…”

Risai told him, “Don’t dwell on it.” He fell silent, soon after emerging as huge tiger, with terrifying wings spanning even longer than the length of Night’s serpentine form. “Let’s go.”

The dragon beast that was Zodiac was occupied with Day, who was doing her best job distracting someone yet, and with an additional passenger. She figured if she had kept it up long enough, maybe something would happen. She wasn’t sure what, but something. Boy, was she glad when a giant Demon tackled the king. The two huge bodies came crashing to the ground, destroying everything beneath them.

Day got a better look, seeing that the Demon that had interfered was serpentine in shape. She soon recognized it as her brother’s Demon form. He put up a fight clawing and snapping at the enormous dragon before him. Another Demon soon came to aid Night.

A tiger a little more than half the size of Zodiac, with a huge wingspan and someone she didn’t recognize, however she was extremely grateful for the intervention of both her brother and this new Demon.

“ What the hell? That’s Risai!” Snow exclaimed, recognizing his Demon transformation from when she first encountered him. “He was alive this entire time?”

Day responded “ I don't know who that is, but if he's on our side—” The cry of the three beasts’ quarreling interrupted Day. Night feinted away from terrifying talons while Risai tried to wound the king as best as he could while he was distracted, attacking with sharp fangs and clawing wildly wherever he could. The king’s scales, however, proved to be a formidable piece of armor, only leaving thin scratch marks and hardly hurting him.

With his enormous stature, it didn't take long for Zodiac to overpower Risai, retaliating by crushing Risai under his claw, which covered a great portion of his body. Risai tried to wriggle free, fearing the flames that were sure to come next.

An act of desperation led him to claw at the king's underside. It surprised Risai when his sharp nails easily penetrated the skin and blood leaked from the wound.  This seemed to startle Zodiac a moment, as he hesitated to look at what happened.

Risai caught on quickly. Anything that wasn’t covered with scales was soft skin, making the king's chest a very vulnerable area. Risai escaped from underneath the king’s claw while he was distracted and lunged for his chest again, though it wasn't so easy a second time. Zodiac tossed his tail, throwing Risai away from him and took to the sky once more. Risai didn’t give in and shot into the air after the king, where they engaged in a fearsome battle. Night could only stay put and watch the exchange.

 

Now that the heat was taken off of Day, she took a much needed rest on the ground, landed near where Final was waiting in place, allowing Snow to wobble her way out her grasp.

Snow turned to the red-headed Demon, “What's going on?” She prompted.

“ Supposedly, they're going to take care of it,” Final answered, “Or so that evil guy, whatshisface, says.

“Risai.” Snow informed. Final shrugged, refusing to care.  ”Are you sure they don't need more help?”

Final crossed his arms and tapped his fingers impatiently against his forearm. “That guy just told me to wait to give the ‘final blow’. I guess he's going to set it up so that I can kill the king.”

Day rubbed her chin, looking as if she were thinking about something. “So, I guess that takes us of the race for now?”

“Yes, for now we can only watch.” Final said.

“Mm...I wish I could help, but I've never transformed before.”

Snow shot her a toothy grin. “Don't worry about it! I'm sure Night and Risai can handle it.” She assured.

 

Back in the sky, the battle between Zodiac and Risai was brutal and furious; Zodiac shot streams after streams of fire at Risai, who swiftly maneuvered through the air to avoid the flames. When Risai found an opening to attack, he blasted toward the king, looking like a blur to the spectators below and latched onto the king's neck with his fangs, while puncturing the weak skin of his belly his sharp claws. Blood begin to drip from him and fall like rain to the ground.

Zodiac growled and he retaliated angrily with sharp talons. Risai released the hold he had and managed to get away, but not without being wounded from the king’s nails. A deep gash left Risai bleeding out terribly but he couldn't bother with it, the king was top priority.

More fire threatened to burn Risai but easily avoided it. He looked down. Night was there, watching carefully and waiting to strike. There didn’t seem to be any other way to get to Zodiac other than attacking headfirst. Or so Risai thought.

 

Day was in the air again, faster this time around, and Zodiac's head whipped as he started assaulted her with balls of fire.

It was just the distraction Risai needed. He flew in and tackled so hard, the king lost momentum and they fell. Risai lashed out, everywhere he could, tearing at any part of Zodiac’s body not guarded by hard scales. He finally managed to tear through a wing.

The king was coming down and Risai thought this was it but even after hitting the ground, the king recovered, pushed Risai from his body and punted him away with his tail. His large body made a dent in the earth and blood seeped into the brown dirt.

Still, before anyone else around could react, Risai shot back. Absolutely livid, he charged toward the king, who simply swat him like a fly. Risai skidded the surface once again, this time he stayed down. Zodiac's flames followed almost immediately after. He was sure to be torched but Risai refused to let this be the end for him.

Something, curled around him like a protective barrier— something Risai shortly found was Night’s own body, being hit by the fire and taking it like it was nothing.

“Doesn't that hurt?” Risai asked, dumbfounded.

“I can barely feel it.” Night joked.

He was lying, Risai could hear it in his tone and the smell of Night's scales melting permeated the air around them. “Just hold on a little more.” Risai requested.

Risai waited until the flames let up, then following the path up, flew until the king's head was in sight.

Zodiac was taken aback by Risai's sudden appearance, not expecting a hard strike to the face. His head whipped back from the blow. More attacks, bites and scratches to the face. Risai even ripped off a horn, the pointed projection falling to the ground; its size was that of a fully grown oak.

“Night!”  Risai called, but Night was already slithering quickly at the king. His long body wrapped and coiled around every appendage until Zodiac could no longer move.

Zodiac screeched and thrashed trying to get loose, but though Zodiac was a huge dragon, the length of Night's body out measured his massive size.

Risai turned his head to the general direction he assumed Final was, ordering, “Now,boy, while he's incapacitated!”

 

Final blinked, apprehension filled his veins now that he was called to battle so suddenly. “Wh-wha—”

“Use his horn! Quickly!”

“Ah!” Final yelped. Day had snatched him up and flew him closer to the fighting, and, more importantly, the horn that had fallen from Zodiac.

Day asked, “Can you pick it up?”

“I-I dunno.” Final said immediately trying to find out. He tore off his scarf just for extra measures and tried lifting the horn. He could get it over his head with much effort, but the moving around part may prove to be a challenge.

Night had the king restricted and pinned the the ground; The skin of his underside was exposed so obviously, someone should have painted a target on the king.

“Final, hurry, I can’t hold him down forever!”

“I can barely move holding this thing! Can't you do this instead?”

 

Risai looked as if he wanted to answer, however a weak, but still potentially deadly burst of flame caught his attention instead. It appeared Zodiac was abusing his throat, affecting the strength of the flames. “We're a little preoccupied!”

“Can't you move him like closer. Or upward? I could throw it?”

Growling, Risai somehow managed to get under the king, lifting up his body that it met Final's demands just a bit. “Are you satisfied yet?”

“Yeah, totally, that's much better—”

 

Before Final could finish, the king roared indignantly, flailing wildly. Night, thoroughly worn out, could let maintain his hold and Zodiac broke out of his grip. Slithering away from the angry dragon was top priority on Night’s to do list, but Zodiac had Night in his deadly grip, holding him down tightly with every appendage so that Night could not slip out of his grasp.

Risai was pacing circles around Zodiac, observing carefully so that he could strike. Zodiac,  however watched Risai just as intently. Zodiac’s sharp talons were beginning to pierce through Night's scales.

Sensing Night's discomfort, Risai grew restless, now pacing around the king even faster. He only circled him a few more times before going in for an attack. Zodiac guarded with his tail, throwing out in front of him so that Risai’s momentum was stopped. Zodiac did not expect Risai, however to bite down and pull. He was now dragging his body away from Night with great effort.

Annoyed, Zodiac slammed his tail downward, Risai went along with it, but he wasn't giving up. Again, Risai was trying to tackle Zodiac to the ground. Instead Zodiac countered so that they were literally butting heads. Of course, with Zodiac’s size and obvious power, it didn't take long for him to completely overpower Risai.

Zodiac towered over Risai, triumphant and ready to deliver the Final blow. Risai was unable to move, but he refused to die. He wouldn’t allow himself to go out so foolishly.

 

Zodiac lunged for the kill when he was thrown onto his back, sliding just a few feet away. Risai rose up to see what had happened. Night was practically unconscious and he hadn't done anything since he was trapped.

He eventually saw the giant horn protruding from Zodiac's body and understood. Final had a clear shot and he took it. A chill ran through Risai’s body. He was intimidated by how much strength Final truly possessed. Honestly he was lucky to be alive after his fight with him.

Just a bit away, Night scurried closer to Final, Snow, and Day before he de-transformed. He was now laying flat on his back, beaten and weary. He glanced up at Final with great effort who looked back uneasily.

“Did you kill him?” Night asked.

“I—.” replied Final.

Risai entered the group interrupting Final answer, looking fine at first, but he eventually collapsed to the ground, falling to his knees and panting heavily.

Concerned, Day asked: “Are you alright?” Risai simply nodded.

“I guess you do have your limits.” Snow commented. “Still, gotta applaud your stamina.” Her eyes slid to Final. “And you, holy shit, I knew you were strong but that was crazy! I can't believe you threw that thing!”

“Y-yeah…”

Risai narrowed his eyes at him. “What?

Surprised by his question, Final asked cautiously, “W-what?”

“Why are you acting like...that?”

Final crossed his arms. “Nothing, it just seemed too easy.”

“Oh, shut up Final!” Snow exclaimed. “You're always like this. You should be happy— you just killed the king!”

“It was kinda cool.” Day complimented with a smile. Final grumbled to himself, not so sure.

“I really can’t feel much of anything. Can someone help me up?” requested Night. Day kindly propped her brother against her knee. He sighed. “Thank you, Day. You're the best.” she beamed a smile at him in response. “Seriously, Risai  I don't know how, well, you're alive honestly.”

Snow nodded in agreement.“You took the most beating out of all of us, but right now you hardly have a scratch on you. I saw you get struck by the king's lightning and then fall to the ground from the sky, with no cushion, and I know that he ripped a hole in you. Really, how are you alive?”

Risai chuckled to himself. “I've been through worse.” he stated simply. Everyone was taken aback by his words.

“And you said that last time,” Snow pointed out. “Really what could have been worse than any of that?”

Risai frowned. “I would really rather not talk about it.” Night believed it was his first time seeing Risai become uncomfortable.

“Hey—”

A sudden rumbling put whatever Final had to say to rest. Then a terrifying screech filled the air. The Demons on the ground turned their heads to Zodiac, who was not as dead as they had all thought. One of his talons had reached up to pull out the horn from his body. Then he rose, staring directly at the five of them. Ice ran through their blood when he roared again and began to move toward them at a fearsome speed.

Risai stood quickly, “Move!” he ordered. However, they never got the chance to move, distracted by the king suddenly reverting back to his human form; He was down on one knee and holding his bleeding chest as if the blood would stop gushing through. His eyes, crimson red, stared them down hatefully.

The five Demons were frozen, waiting to see what would happen next. Risai took a defensive stance in front of everyone, and to his surprise Final stood with him.

Zodiac took a breath, intending to char every Demon in front of him but instead, coughing up a shocking amount of blood. “No…!” he murmured. He tried to stand and fell. He caught himself with his arms, though they were shaking wildly. “No, I refuse to die…!” Forcing himself up to his feet, Zodiac rose and ran toward the group, leaving a trail of blood behind him.

Risai intercepted first. Their hands interlocked, so Zodiac didn’t have his hands to attack. But neither did Risai. Lunging his head forward, Zodiac bit a chunk of flesh from Risai’s exposed neck and tossed him aside.

Final was his next target, though since he was in better shape than Risai, he put up a better fight. The king was severely injured and far weaker, so Final had no problems getting a few blows on the king, bringing him to his knees. Final kicked him in the back while he was down; a grave error. He forgot about the spikes lining his spine and accidentally impaled his leg against the kings back. Laughing maniacally, Zodiac grabbed Final’s leg and bent it in ways it should not have been bent.

Of course, it was Snow’s turn to intervene before he could do anymore damage. She and Day pulled the king away from Final and tossed him to the ground. Day even went as far as to stab her heel into the king’s chest wound, hoping the excess pain and blood loss would kill him, or at least make him pass out. It only made him angrier. Zodiac dug a clawed hand into her leg and snatched her off her feet. Day landed hard on the back of her head.

Zodiac caught Night lurking behind him before he had a chance to interfere with his actions. He focused his attention on Night now and turned to face him. Night decided to act quickly and grabbed Zodiac by his remaining horn, quickly snapping it off and driving it into his body.

Zodiac was shocked by this and had no time to react before Night removed the horn and stabbed it into him a few more times. The last blow hurt worse than any of the others and Zodiac dropped to his knees once more. Night backpedaled until his own fatigue got the better of him and he fell flat on his butt, his eyes wide with shock.

Zodiac figured his heart had been stabbed one too many times and it was finally giving up. He spat up more blood followed by a swear. “No! No…! I don’t…” He doubled over catching himself with an arm again, but he was progressively becoming weaker. Frustrated tears filled his eyes. “Lian...I...” He tried to push himself back up on to just fall back, this time his face flat in the dirt.

 

Zodiac was still and it took a couple a moments for Night to realize that the king was dead. Truly dead.

“Are you alright?” Snow’s voice came to him and he looked to her with wide eyes, simply nodding. Snow turned to Day who was groaning and clutching her head. “Okay, so you two are fine.”

“What about Risai?” Night asked absently. His eyes moved to Final, who had limped his way over to Risai to check on him.

Final narrowed his eyes at Risai in confusion. He was on the ground, holding his throat and wide eyed and shaking, as if the whole ordeal had traumatized him. Though, Final was curious as to why he looked like that now since Risai had been near death quite a few times now.

“Are you...alright?” Final asked cautiously. It seemed to break Risai out of his trance because his eyes regained their focus and he sat up, still holding his neck.

“O-of course.” He removed his hand, neck still bleeding, but the wound wasn’t as deadly as it was before. Risai finally stood up, walking away from Final and toward Night. “Zodiac, he’s dead?”

“I checked his pulse,” Snow answered, “He’s really out this time.” Final managed to limp over to the group. Snow pouted, “You know I don’t know why, but actually killing him this time doesn’t feel as good as before.”

Final nodded in agreement. It was silent until Risai spoke up, though quieter than he usually was.

“We should probably rest up and figure out what to do. You guys can’t return to that village.”

“Yeah, since you burned it down.” accused Final. Risai didn’t have the stamina to argue with the boy.

The five eventually took up Risai’s position and found a suitable place to rest up.

 

The Aftermath

 

The group of five Demons took a couple of days resting up in the ruins. It wasn’t the most comfortable place, but their combined exhaustion outweighed their want for a comfortable bed to sleep in. Afterwards they wandered the forest until, they found actual foliage, untouched by the forest fire Zodiac had started. Nature had taken care of the fire so it was one more thing off their list to forget about.

Day, who was least tired of group, scouted ahead and managed to find a sizable village right out of the forest, where they took refuge.

Currently they sat around in the lobby of the infirmary  that had taken them in to treat their cuts and bruises; set Final’s leg a gave him a pair of crutches; Painkillers for Day since she was apparently suffering from a concussion. Risai refused to be treated by anyone. Everyone had been quiet for the most part, save Snow trying to lighten up everyone with her distasteful jokes.

 

Night, who hadn’t really spoken since he had killed Zodiac, out of the blue asked: “Lian...is that the other one?”

Final’s brow furrowed. “Other what?”

“His other kid. He said ‘Lian’ before he died.”

No one said anything. For a long while, it was like Night had never said anything.

“I recall hearing the queen call her child that, yes.” Risai eventually answered quietly. He too had been quiet, uncharacteristically so.

“She’s parentless now.” Night stated.

“I hope you aren’t suggesting we steal her from the castle and take care of her.” Final said.

NIght shook his head. “No, I wasn’t. I was just...stating a fact. I killed her parents…”

Another silence fell over them. This time it was Snow.

“So, where do we go from here?”

“Good question.” Final responded. “Where does someone go after killing the entire monarchy.”

“It’s not entirely gone, their daughter—”

Final cut Night off, “Why don’t you just raise her yourself if you are so concerned?”

“Okay.”

“Okay? Did you just say okay?”

“Yes.” Night answered. Final was startled by how serious he looked.

“You just said you weren’t going to do that.” Final reasoned.

“I said I wasn’t going to kidnap her from the castle. This is entirely plausible. We go there and raise her and stir her on the right path so she doesn’t turn out like Zodiac.”

“That’s so stupid!” Final exclaimed. “You don’t care about that, you just feel guilty.”

“You’re right, I do. But listen, there’s more to it than that. We work under the monarch, I’m sure they’ll be happy to hire more guards— or better yet, let’s just identify ourselves as the people who assassinated the king.”

Final shook his head. “Why the hell would we do that?”

“Think about it,” Night continued. “Zodiac didn’t exactly set the best example as king. We tell people we killed him. We’ll probably be like heroes. We, I dunno get a cool position of authority. Prevent anyone from usurping Lian and you know, raise her I guess.”

Final was speechless.

“It’s actually,” Snow began, “Not a bad idea…but then again I guess that’s why you can’t say anything, huh Final?” he glared at her angrily. “Hey, in the end we get a neat place to stay.” she pointed out.

“If it actually works.” Final said

“I agree,” Risai added, everyone looked to him. “With Night I mean.”

“Ooh, big shocker.” Final mockingly.

Ignoring him, Risai continued, “As his former guard, I know a lot of people will be happy to hear about the king’s demise. Zodiac, and his queen I suppose, were the only ones in charge really. The guards are pretty much useless. If we act quickly, we could potentially be some sort of stand in monarch until the child is fully capable to rule of her own accord. It will ease Night’s guilt and we all will have a safe place to stay.”

Everyone looked to Final as he mulled it over. “I suppose…”He said eventually.

“Good. Then it's settled. We'll go back.” Night decided.

Final figured it wasn't the worst thing they could do. It appeared Night had actually thought this one all the way through for once. Maybe it would be so bad to rebuild the monarchy. It could bring together a lot a people and no one would have to live in fear of a corrupt king anymore.

It was the beginning of a brand new world.

  
  
  


THIS IS THE END

 

  
  
  
  


 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> it's over and i still hate it  
> pls tell me what i can do better...


End file.
